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STANDARD 

NOVELS. 

N° XLVIII. 



*' No kind of literature is so generally attractive as Fiction. Pictures of 
life and manners, and Stories of adventure, are more eagerly received by 
the many than graver productions, however important these latter maybe. 
Apuleius is better remembered by his fable of Cupid and Psyche than by 
his abstruser Platonic writings; and the Decameron of Boccaccio has out- 
lived the Latin Treatises, and other learned works of that author." 



ADVENTURES 

OF 

A YOUNGER SON. 

COMPLETE IN ONE VOLUME. 






LONDON: 
RICHARD BENTLEY, NEW BURLINGTON STREET. 

BELL & BRADFUTE, EDINBURGH; 
CUMMING AND FERGUSON, DUBLIN. 

1846. 



London : 

Pjfiiited by A. Spotti* wood c, 

New-Street-iSqu:ire. 













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?idon, P ' 



ADVENTURES 



OF 



A YOUNGER SON. 



Ed- 



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17vc lot inm £*/ 



And I will war, at least in words, (and — should 

My chance so happen — deeds) with all who war 

With thought ; — and of thought's foes by far most rude a 

Tyrants and sycophants have been and are. 

I know not who may conquer : if I could 

Have such a prescience, it should be no bar 

To this my plain, sworn, downright detestation 

Of every despotism in every nation. 

Byron, 




LONDON: 
RICHARD BEXTLEY, NEW BURLINGTON STREET. 

BELL & BRADFUTE, EDINBURGH; 
GUMMING AND FERGUSON, DUBLIN* 

1846. 



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ADVENTURES 



A YOUNGER SON. 



CHAPTER I. 



Love or lust makes man sick, and wine much sicker, 

Ambition rends, and gaming gains a loss ; 
But making money, slowly first, then quicker, 

And adding still a little through each cross 
(Which will come over things) beats love and liquor. Byron. 

My birth was unpropitious. I came into the world, branded 
and denounced as a vagrant ; for I was a younger son of a 
family, so proud of their antiquity , that even gout and mort- 
gaged estates were traced, many generations back, on the 
genealogical tree, as ancient heirlooms of aristocratic origin, 
and therefore reverenced. In such a house a younger son 
was like the cub of a felon-wolf in good King Edgar's days, 
when a price was set upon his head. There have been laws 
compelling parents to destroy their puny offspring ; and a 
Spartan mother might have exclaimed with Othello, while 
extinguishing the life of her yet unconscious infant, 

" I that am cruel, am yet merciful, 
I would not have thee linger in thy pain ; " 

which was just and merciful, in comparison with the atro- 
cious law of primogeniture. My grandfather was a general, 
and had little to give my father, his only son, but patronage 
in his profession. Nature, in some sort, made him amends 

B 



2 ADVENTURES OF 

by bestowing that which leads to fortune oftener than 
genius, virtue, or such discarded claimants — a handsome 
exterior set off by courtly manners. His youth was not 
distinguished by any marked peculiarity, running the course 
of the gallants of the day. Women, wine, the court, the 
camp, formed the theatre of his ambition, and there he was 
accounted to play his part well. In his twenty-fourth year 
he became enamoured of a lovely and gentle girl. His 
thoughts took a new turn. He discovered (for in that he 
was learned) that the passion was mutual ; and the only 
barrier to the completion of their wishes was fortune. Their 
families, but not their expectations, were equal. Youth 
and love are generally proof against the admonitions of 
parents and guardians. As to money, settlements, and 
deeds, first love is of too sincere and passionate a character 
to be controlled by worldly calculating selfishness, which, in 
after life, is mingled up more or less in all our dealings 
with women, and theirs with us. The noble and generous 
passions, animated by first love, often impress on the un- 
settled and fluctuating character .of youth a fixedness, which 
time cannot wholly destroy. Would to Heaven my father 
had united his fate with her's, for her worth has stood 
proof against time and change ! While he was labouring 
to overcome the impediments to his marriage, he was or- 
dered with a party to recruit in the west. Thinking their 
separation temporary, they parted, as all those, under such 
circumstances, have parted, with protestations of eternal 
fidelity ; but, what is not so general, considering his being 
a gay soldier, he continued true to his oaths for three 
months. 

At a ball, given by the county sheriff on his nomination, 
his daughter, an heiress, when desired by her father to give 
her hand, for the first dance, to the man of highest rank in 
the room, who happened to be the oldest, declared she 
would give it to the handsomest. She selected, my father, 
and with him she danced. This preference flattered him, 
and its being a subject of conversation gave birth to ideas 
which, otherwise, might not have entered his head. She 
was a dark, masculine woman of three and twenty ; but she 
was the richest, and that was enough to make her seem at 



A YOUNGER SON. 3 

least the mcst interesting. My father was naturally, or by 
the example of the world, of a selfish turn of mind. Rich 
and beautiful soon became synonymous terms with him. He 
received marked encouragement from the heiress. He saw 
those he had envied, envying him. Gold was his god, for 
he had daily experienced those mortifications to which the 
want of it subjected him : he determined to offer up his 
heart to the temple of Fortune alone, and waited but an 
opportunity of displaying his apostacy to love. The struggle 
with his better feelings was of short duration. He called 
his conduct prudence and filial obedience — and those are 
virtues — thus concealing its naked atrocity by a seemly 
covering. His letters grew briefer, and their interval greater, 
to the lady of his love — his visits became frequent to the 
lady of wealth. But why dwell on an occurrence so com- 
mon in the world — the casting away of virtue and beauty 
for riches, though the devil gives them ? He married ; 
found the lady's fortune a great deal less, and the lady a 
great deal worse than he had anticipated ; went to town ir- 
ritated and disappointed, with the consciousness of having 
merited his fate ; sunk part of his fortune in idle parade to 
satisfy his wife ; and, his affairs being embarrassed by the 
lady's extravagance, he was, at length, compelled to sell out 
of the army, and retire to economise in the country. 

Malthus had not yet enlightened the world. Every suc- 
ceeding year he reluctantly registered in the family Bible 
the birth of a living burthen. He cursed my mother's fer- 
tility, and the butcher's and baker's bills. He grew gloomy 
and desponding. 

A bequest fell to him, and he seriously set about amassing 
money, which was henceforth the leading passion of his life. 
He became what is called a prudent man. If a poor rela- 
tion applied to him, he talked of his duty to his wife and 
children; and when richest, complained most of his poverty, 
of extortion, and of the unconscionable price of every thing. 
He contended that he could not afford to send his children 
to school; learning was too dear; it was unnecessary, for his 
education at Westminster had proved of no benefit, as he 
had never since looked into the Greek, Latin, and all the 
books he had read there by compulsion ; yet he was not 
b 2 



* ADVENTURES OP 

more ignorant than his neighbours. He knew the import- 
ance of money, and the necessity of accumulating it, and 
could calculate the value of learning. Perhaps he believed 
exclusively in the doctrine of innate talent. Knowledge, in 
his opinon, would come when called for. It would be time 
enough when our professions were determined on, to learn 
what was indispensable ; and as my brother's and mine 
would be that of arms, very little was necessary. He hated 
superfluity in any thing; besides, he had observed that those 
in his regiment who were addicted to books were the most 
troublesome, and their learning was no step to their advance- 
ment. 



CHAPTER II. 

And oft 
In wantonness of spirit, plunging down 
Into their green and glassy gulphs, and making 
My way to shells and sea-weed, all unseen 
By those above, till they wax'd fearful; then 
Returning with my grasp full of such tokens 
As show'd that I had search'd the deep, exulting 
With a far-dashing stroke, and drawing deep 
The long suspended breath, again I spurn'd 
The foam which broke around me, and pursued 
My track like a sea-bird. Byron. 

My brother was tractable, mild, and uncomplaining. I was 
in continual scrapes. I insisted on following the bent of 
my inclinations ; and opposition only sharpened my desires. 
We were not allowed, among the many petty restrictions of 
our unkind governor, to stray off the gravelled paths in the 
garden. My brother submitted to this ; while I sought for 
compensation in our neighbour's gardens, returning from 
them with fruits and flowers in abundance. My brother 
was contented with his daily walk upon the common or the 
road ; I, with my pockets well filled with bread and apples, 
climbed the hills, or descended them to learn swimming in 
the rivers. I hated .all that thwarted me — parsons, pastors, 
and masters. Every thing I was directed cautiously to 



A YOUNGER SON. 5 

shun, as dangerous or wrong, I sought with avidity, as 
giving the most pleasure. Had I been treated with affection, 
or even with the show of it, I believe that I also should 
have been tractable, mild, and uncomplaining. Punishment 
and severity of all kinds were the only marks of paternal 
love that fell to my share, from my earliest remembrance. 

My father had a fancy for a raven, that, with ragged 
wings, and a grave antique aspect, used to wander solitarily 
about the garden. He abhorred children ; and whenever 
he saw any of us, he used to chase us out of his walks. I 
was then five years old. Had the raven pitched on any 
other spot than the one he selected, the fruit-garden, I cer- 
tainly should never liave disputed his right of possession. 
As it was, we had all, from the time we could walk, consi- 
dered him and my father the two most powerful, awful, 
and tyrannical persons on earth. The raven was getting 
into years ; he had a grey and grisly look ; he halted on one 
leg ; his joints were stiff, his legs rough as the bark of a 
cork-tree, and he was covered with large warts : his eyes had 
a bleared and sinister expression ; and he passed most of his 
time idling in the sun under a south wall, against which 
grew the delicious plums of the garden. Many were the 
stratagems we used to lure him from the spot ; the garbage,, 
on which he gloated, was offered in vain. His moroseness 
and ferocity, and our difficulty in getting fruit, were insup- 
portable. We tried to intimidate him with sticks, but w r ere 
too weak to make the least impression on his weather- 
hardened carcase; and we got the w r orst of it. I used, 
when I could do so slily, to throw stones at him, but this 
had no effect. Thus things continued. I had in vain sought 
for redress from the gardener and servants : they laughed at 
us, and jeered us. 

One day I had a little girl for my companion, whom I 
had enticed from the nursery to go with me to get some 
fruit clandestinely. We slunk out, and entered the garden 
unobserved. Just as we were congratulating ourselves under 
a cherry tree, up comes the accursed monster of a raven. 
It was no longer to be endured. He seized hold of the 
little girl's frock ; she was too frightened to scream ; I did 
not hesitate an instant. I told her not to be afraid, and 
b 3 



6 ADVENTURES OF 

threw myself upon him. He let her go, and attacked me 
with bill and talon. I got hold of him by the neck, and, 
heavily lifting him up, struck his body against the tree and 
the ground ; but nothing seemed to hurt him. He was 
hard as a rock. Thus we struggled, I evidently the weaker 
party. The little girl, who was my favourite, said, :e I'll 
go and call the gardener !" 

I said, " No ; he will tell my father : I will hang the 
old fellow " (meaning the raven, not my father) ; " give 
me your sash ! " 

She did so, and with great exertion I succeeded, though I 
was dreadfully mauled, in fastening one end round the old 
tyrant's neck ; I then climbed the cherry tree, and, holding 
one end of the sash, I put it round a horizontal branch, 
when, jumping on the ground, I fairly succeeded in sus- 
pending my foe. 

At this moment my brother came running towards me. 
When he saw the plight I was in, he was alarmed; but, on 
beholding our old enemy swinging in the air, he shouted 
for joy. Fastening the end of the sash, we commenced 
stoning him to death. After we were tired of that sport, and 
as he was, to all appearance, dead, we let him down. He 
fell on his side, when I seized hold of a raspberry-stake, 
to make sure of him by belabouring his head. To our utter 
amazement and consternation, he sprung up with a hoarse 
scream, and caught hold of me. Our first impulse was to 
run ; but he withheld me, so I again fell on him, calling to 
my brother for assistance, and bidding him lay fast hold of 
the riband, and to climb the tree. I attempted to prevent 
his escape. His look was now most terrifying : one eye 
was hanging out of his head, the blood coming from his 
mouth, his wings flapping the earth in disorder, and with 
a ragged tail, which I had half plucked by pulling at him 
during his first execution. He made a horrible struggle for 
existence, and I was bleeding all over. Now, with the aid 
of my brother, and as the raven was exhausted by exertion 
and wounds, we succeeded in gibbeting him again ; and then 
with sticks we cudgelled him to death, beating his head to 
pieces. Afterwards we tied a stone to him, and sunk him 
in a duck-pond. 



A YOUNGER SON. 

This was the first and most fearful duel I ever had. I 
mention it, childish though it be, not only because it lives 
vividly in my memory, but as it was an event that, in re- 
viewing my after-life, seems evidently the first ring on which 
the links of a long chain have been formed. It shows how 
long I could endure annoyance and oppression, and that when 
at last excited, I never tried half measures, but proceeded to 
extremities without stop or pause. This was my grievous 
fault, and grievously have I repented it ; for I have de- 
stroyed, where, in justice, I was justified, but where, in 
mercy, I ought only to have corrected; and thus thestanders- 
by have considered that, which I only thought a fair re- 
taliation, revenge. 



CHAPTER III. 

There arose 
From the near school-room voices that, alas! 
Were but one echo from a world of woes, 
The harsh and grating strife of tyrants and of foes, Shelley. 

Phrensied with new woes, 
Unused to bend, by hard compulsion bent. Keats. 

Jn compliance with my father's notions respecting the in- 
utility of early education, I was not sent to school till I was 
between nine and ten years old. I was then an unusually 
great, bony, awkward boy. Whilst my parents were in their 
daily discussion of the question as to the period at which 
the schooling of their sons was to commence, a trivial oc- 
currence decided the question. I was perched on an apple 
tree, throwing the fruit down to my brother, when our father 
came on us suddenly. Every trifle put him in a passion. 
Commanding us to follow him, he walked rapidly on through 
the grounds, into the road, without entering the house. He 
led us towards the town and through the streets, without 
uttering a syllable, a distance of two miles. I followed with 
b 4 



8 ADVENTURES OP 

dogged indifference, yet at times inquired of my brother 
what he thought would be the probable result, but he made 
no reply. Arriving at the further extremity of the town, 
my father stopped, asked some questions inaudible to us, 
and stalked forward to a walled and dreary building. We 
followed our dignified father up a long passage ; he rung at 
a prison -looking entrance-gate; we were admitted into a 
court; then crossing a spacious dark hall, we were conducted 
into a small parlour, when the door was shut, and the ser- 
vant left us. In ten minutes, which seemed an eternity, 
entered a dapper little man, carrying his head high in the 
air, with large bright silver buckles in his shoes, a stock 
buckled tightly round his neck, spectacled, and powdered. 
There was a formal precision about him, most fearful to a 
boy. A hasty glance from his hawk's eye, first at our father, 
and then at us, gave him an insight into the affair. With 
repeated bows to our father, he requested him to take a chair, 
and pointed with his finger for us to do the same. There 
was an impatience and rapidity in every thing he said ; 
which indicated that he liked doing and not talking. 

( ' Sir," said our parent, ei I believe you are Mr. Sayers ? " 

" Yes, sir." 

" Have you any vacancies in your school ? " 

" Yes, sir." 

" Well, sir, will you undertake the charge of these un- 
governable vagabonds ? I can do nothing with them. Why, 
sir, this fellow" (meaning me) " does more mischief in my 
house than your sixty boys can possibly commit in yours." 

At this the pedagogue, moving his spectacles towards the 
sharpened tip of his nose, peered over them, measuring me 
from head to foot ; and clenching his hand, as if, in ima- 
gination, it already grasped the birch, gave an oblique nod, 
to intimate that he would subdue me. My inauguration 
proceeded — 

" He is savage, incorrigible ! Sir, he will come to the 
gallows, if you do not scourge the devil out of him. I 
have this morning detected him in an act of felony, for 
which he deserves a halter. My elder son, sir, was in- 
stigated by him to be an accomplice ; for naturally he is 
of a better disposition." With this, my father, after 



A YOUNGER SON. 9 

arranging what was indispensable, bowed to Mr. Sayers, 
and without noticing us. withdrew. 

Consider the outrage to my feelings. Torn from my 
home, without notice or preparation ; delivered, in bitter 
words, an outcast, into the power of a stranger ; and, a 
minute afterwards, to find myself in a slip of ground, 
dedicated to play, but, by its high walls and fastnesses, 
looking more like a prison -yard. Thirty or forty boys, 
from ^ve to fifteen years of age, stood around us, making 
comments, and asking questions. I wished the earth to 
open and bury me, and hide the torturing emotions with 
which my bosom swelled. Now that I look back, I re- 
peat that wish with my whole soul; and could I have 
known the future, or but have dreamed of the destiny 
that awaited me, boy as I was, I would have dashed my 
brains out against the wall, where I leaned in sullenness 
and silence. My brother's disposition enabled him to 
bear his fate in comparative calmness ; but the red spots 
on his cheeks, the heavy eyelid, the suppressed voice, 
showed our feelings, though differing in acuteness, to be 
the same. 

Miserable as I was during my school-days, the first was 
the bitterest. At supper, I remember, I was so choked 
with my feelings, that I could not swallow my dog-like 
food, arranged in scanty portions ; and my first relief was 
when, in my beggarly pallet, the rushlights extinguished, 
and surrounded by the snoring of the wearied boys — to me 
a sound of comfort — I could give vent to my overcharged 
heart in tears. I sobbed aloud ; but on any one's moving, 
as if awake, I held my breath till re-assured. Thus I 
sobbed on, and was not heard ; till the night was far ad- 
vanced, and my pillow bathed in tears, when, outworn, 
I fell into a sleep, from which I was rudely shaken, un- 
refreshed, at seven in the morning. I then descended to 
the school-room. 

Boys, acting under the oppression of their absolute 
masters, are cruel, and delight in cruelty. All that is evil 
in them is called forth ; all that is good repressed. They 
remember what they endured when consigned as bond- 
slaves ; the tricks, all brutish, that were played on them ; 



10 ADVENTURES OF 

the gibes at their simplicity ; their being pilfered by the 
cunning, and beaten by the strong ; and they will not allow 
a new comer to escape from the ordeal. Boys at school 
are taught cruelty, cunning, and selfishness : and he is 
their victim and fool who retains a touch of kindliness. 

The master entered. He was one of those pedagogues 
cf, what is called, the old school. He had implicit faith 
in his divining rod, which he kept in continual exercise, 
applying it on all doubtful occasions. It seemed more 
like a house of correction than an academy of learning ; 
and when I thought on my father's injunction not to spare 
the rod, my heart sickened. 

As my school-life was one scene of suffering, I am im- 
pelled to hasten it over as briefly as possible ; more par- 
ticularly as the abuses, of which I complain, are, if not 
altogether remedied, at least mitigated. I was flogged 
seldom more than once a day, or caned more than once an 
hour. After I had become inured to it, I was callous ; 
and was considered by the master the most obdurate, 
violent, and incorrigible rascal that had ever fallen under 
his hands. Every variation of punishment was inflicted 
on me, without effect. As to kindness, it never entered 
into his speculations to essay it, since he, possibly, had not 
heard of such a thing. 

In a short while I grew indifferent to shame and fear. 
Every kind and gentle feeling of my naturally affectionate 
disposition seemed subdued by the harsh and savage treat- 
ment of my master ; and I was sullen, vindictive, or in- 
sensible. Vain efforts — for they were ever vain — to avoid 
the disgrace of punishment, occupied the minds of others. 
I began by venting my rage on the boys, and soon gained 
that respect by fear, which I would not obtain by appli- 
cation to my book. I thus had my first lesson as to the 
necessity of depending on myself; and the spirit in me 
was gathering strength, in despite of every endeavour to 
destroy it, like a young pine flourishing in the cleft of a 
bed of granite. 



A YOUNGER SON. 1J 



CHAPTER IV. 

The relationship of father and son 
Is no more valid than a silken leash 
Where lions tug adverse ; if iove grow not 
From interchanged love through many years. Keats's MS. 

He has cast nature off, which was his shield; 

And nature casts him off, who is her shame. Shelley. 

As my bodily strength increased, I became, out of school, 
the leader in all sports and mischief; but, in school, I 
was in the lowest class. I was determined not to apply 
to learning, and to defy punishment. Indeed, I do not 
recollect that any of the boys acquired useful knowledge 
there. When satisfied with the ascendancy I had gained 
over my schoolfellows, I turned my whole thoughts to 
the possibility of revenging myself on the master. I first 
tried my hand on his understrapper. Having formed a 
party of the most daring of my myrmidons, I planned 
and executed a castigation for our tutor. Once a week we 
were refreshed by long country walks ; in the course of 
one of these the tutor sat down to rest himself ; the boys, 
not acquainted with the plot, were busy gathering nuts ; 
my chosen band loitered near, preparing rods ; when I, 
backed by three of the strongest, fell suddenly upon our 
enemy. I got my hand round his dirty cravat, which I 
continued twisting ; the others seized his arms and legs, 
and threw him on his back. A halloo brought six or 
seven more. He several times nearly succeeded in shaking 
us off; but I never resigned my hold, and when his 
struggles had driven away one boy, another took his place m x 
till, completely overcome, he entreated us, as well as he 
could articulate, to have mercy, and not to strangle him. 
I griped him the tighter, till the sweat dropped from his 
brow like rain from the eaves of a pig's-sty. We then 
gave him a sample of flogging he could never forget. 

The upshot of this is told in a few words. On my 
return to school, our pastor and master (for he was 
clerical), began to have an inkling of what I and his pupils 



12 ADVENTURES OF 

were capable. The dreadful narrative which the usher 
gave of my violence awakened a dread that the sacredness 
of his vocation and sacerdotal robes had been alone re- 
spected by our despair of successful opposition ; that 
having once tasted of the sweets of victory, we might be 
presumptuous enough flatly to refuse obedience to his 
commands; that my influence and example encouraged 
others ; and that he would daily lose ground in his autho- 
rity. This castigation of the usher astonished him. He 
opened his eyes to the necessity of using more decisive 
steps, and of making an example of me, before I was so 
hardened in my audacity, as perhaps to attempt or exe- 
cute some plot against him. His caution came too late. 
He called me to him, standing three steps above me on a 
raised platform. The boys, like young horses, when they 
learn their power, were unruly. I stood, not as I had 
done, drooping before his angry glances, but upright, and 
full of confidence, looking him in the face without quailing. 
He accused me — I pleaded my justification — he grew 
angry — my blood mounted to my forehead — he struck 
me — and I, with one sudden exertion, seized him by the 
legs, when he fell heavily on the back of his head. The 
usher, writing-master, and others, came to his aid ; but 
all the boys sat silent and exulting, awaiting the result in 
wonder. I, unwilling to be seized by the usher, who, 
between fear of the boys and duty to his employer, stood 
irresolute, rushed out of the schoolroom into the garden, 
and there was I in triumph. I resolved that nothing 
should or could compel me to continue in the school, 
which determination I should long before have made, but 
from awe of my father's dreadful severity. I had borne 
two years of such suffering as few could have sustained ; 
nature could endure no more. I was now desperate, and 
therefore without hope or fear. I received a message, by 
one of the servants, to go into the house. After some 
hesitation I went. I was confined in a bedroom by my- 
self, and at supper-time bread and water was brought — 
spare diet certainly, but not much worse than the usual 
fare. I saw no one but the servant. Next day the same 
solitude — the same spare diet. At night a bit of candle 



A YOUNGER SON. 13 

was left to light me to bed ; I know not what impelled 
me, I suppose the hope of release, not revenge — I set fire 
to the bed-curtains. The bed was in a bright flame, the 
smoke arose in clouds : without a thought of escape I 
viewed their progress with boyish delight ; the wainscot 
and wood-work were beginning to burn, the fire crackling 
up the walls, while I could hardly breathe for smoke. The 
servant returned for the candle, and as the door opened 
the draught augmented the flame. I cried out, (i Look 
here, George, I have lighted a fire myself, you said I 
should have none, though it was so cold." The man's 
shrieks gave the alarm. There was little furniture in this 
condemned hold, and the fire was extinguished. I was 
removed to another room, where a man sat up all night 
with me in custody ; and I remember I exulted in the 
dread they all had of me. They called it -arson, treason, 
and blasphemy — these accusations made some impression, 
because I was ignorant of their meaning. I did not see 
my reverend preceptor — perhaps his head ached ; nor 
was I permitted to see any of my comrades, — the latter 
pained me : nay, I was not permitted to see my brother, 
lest I should infect him. 

The next morning I was despatched home under a 
guard. My father was — O happy chance ! — absent. 
An unexpected and considerable fortune had been be- 
queathed to him. He returned, and, either softened by 
his good luck, or from good policy, he never opened his 
lips to me on the subject. But he said to my mother, 
" You seem to have influence over your son. I give him 
up. If you can induce him to act rationally, be it so ; 
if not, he must find another home." I was then about 
eleven years old. 

To give an idea of the progress I made at this birchen 
school, my father, one day after dinner, conversing with 
my mother on the monstrous price of learning, and hint- 
ing that a parish school in the village, to which he was 
compelled to contribute, would have done as well, said, 
turning to me, c ' Come, sir, what have you learnt ? " 

u Learnt !" I ejaculated, speaking in a hesitating voice, 
for my mind misgave me as to what was to follow. 



14 ADVENTURES OP 

" Is that the way to address me? Speak out, you 
dunce ! and say, Sir ! Do you take me for a footboy ? ' 
raising his voice to a roar, which utterly drove out of my 
head what little the schoolmaster had, with incredible 
toil and punishment, driven into it. (C What have you 
learnt, you raggamuffin ? What do you know?" 

" Not much, sir ! " 

et What do you know in Latin ? " 

" Latin, sir ? I don't know Latin, sir ! " 

" Not Latin, you idiot ! Why, I thought they taught 
nothing but Latin." 

" Yes, sir; ciphering." 

" Well, how far did you proceed in arithmetic ? " 

" No, sir ! they taught me ciphering and writing." 

My father looked grave. " Can you work the rule of 
three, you dunce ? " 

" Rule of three, sir ! " 

iC Do you know subtraction? Come, you blockhead, 
answer me ! Can you tell me, if five are taken from 
fifteen, how many remain ?" 

" Five and fifteen, sir, are " counting on my 

fingers, but missing my thumb, " are — are — nineteen 
sir ! " 

" What ! you incorrigible fool ! — Can you repeat your 
multiplication table ? " 

« What table, sir?" 

Then turning to my mother, he said : " Your son is 
a downright idiot, madam, — perhaps knows not his own 
name. Write your name, you dolt ! " 

" Write, sir ! I can't write with that pen, sir ; it is 
not my pen." 

" Then spell your name, you ignorant savage ! " 

< tf Spell, sir?" I was so confounded that I misplaced 
the vowels. He arose in wrath, overturned the table, and 
bruised his shins in attempting to kick me, as I dodged 
him, and rushed out of the room. 



A LOUNGER SON. 15 



CHAPTER V. 

Oh, gold! why call we misers miserable ? 

Theirs is the pleasure that can never pall ; 
Theirs is the best bower-anchor, the chain cable 

Which holds fast other pleasures, great and small. 
Ye who but see the saving man at table, 

And scorn his temperate board, as none at all, 
And wonder how the wealthy can be sparing, 
Know not what visions spring from each cheese-paring. Byrqx, 

My father, notwithstanding his increased fortune, did not 
increase his expenditure ; nay, he established, if possible, 
a stricter system of economy. He had experienced greater 
enjoyment in the accumulation of wealth than in the 
pleasures of social life. The only symptom he ever 
showed of imagination, was in castle-building ; but his 
fabrications were founded on a more solid basis than is 
usually to be met with among the visions of day dreamers. 
No unreal mockery of fairy scenes of bliss found a resting 
place in his bosom. Ingots, money, lands, houses, and 
tenements, constituted his dreams. He became a mighty 
arithmetician, by the aid of a Ready Reckoner, his pocket 
companion ; he set down, to a fraction, the sterling value 
of all his and his wife's relations, their heirs at law, their 
nearest of kin, their ages, and the state of their constitu- 
tions. The insurance table was examined to calculate the 
value of their lives ; to this he added the probable chances 
arising from diseases, hereditary and acquired, always 
forgetting his own gout. He then determined to regulate 
his conduct accordingly; to maintain the most friendly 
intercourse with his wealthy connections, and to keep aloof 
from poor ones. Having no occasion to borrow, his aver- 
sion to lending amounted to antipathy. All his discourses, 
with those whorri he suspected to be needy, were inter- 
larded with the wise sayings of the prudent and niggardly ; 
and the distrust and horror he expressed at the slightest 
allusion to loans, unbacked by security and interest, had 
the effect of making the most impudent and adventurous 
desist from essaying him, and continue in their necessities, 



16 ADVENTURES OF 

or beg, or rob, or starve, in preference to urging their 
wants to him. Till he was rich, he had not been so ob- 
durate on this point. 

We never sat down to table without a lecture on economy. 
It was a natural consequence that I, thwarted on all sides 
till I had acquired a spirit of contradiction, should be in- 
corrigibly free and generous. I was stirred up to evade, by 
cunning, his parsimony towards myself and others. I was 
detected in many delinquencies, having little respect for 
personal property, which is generally the vice of those who 
have none. Eatables diminished in the pantry, and from 
the cupboard ; wine, sweatmeats, and fruit, as I had a par- 
ticular relish for them, owing to their being almost inter- 
dicted, strangely vanished. But at last I was convicted of 
a heinous sin, which appeared of so monstrous and unpre- 
cedented a character, that it was never forgiven or forgotten. 
My father cursed his fate at having such a degenerate son ; 
and that I might not infect others with my example, and 
utterly ruin him, he resolved forthwith to get rid of me. 

The sin I had committed was extracting from its sanc- 
tuary, and giving to a beggar-woman, an entire pigeon-pie, 
dish and all. Perhaps the offence would never have been 
discovered, if the officiously conscientious old woman had 
not returned with the empty pie-dish. I hated her honesty, 
and never afterwards could endure old women. The poor 
creature was summoned by my father; she heard his threats 
of the stocks, and the house of correction, of a charge of 
felony, and transportation, without betraying me ; nor do I 
think he could have elicited the truth, had I not stepped 
forward and confessed the fact. I shall never forget my 
father's wrath. He said, I was not only a thief, but a har- 
dened one ; and vented some portion of his rage in cuffs and 
kicks. I stood firmly, as I had done to my schoolmaster, 
for I had learnt to endure, and my hide had grown thick 
and horny from blows. I neither wept nor asked for mercy. 
When his hands and feet were weary, he said, 

" Get out of my sight, you scoundrel !" I moved not 
a foot, but looked at him scowlingly and undauntedly. 

Lest it should be imagined there was something par- 
ticularly evil in me, requiring the utmost severity, I must 



A YOUNGER SON. 17 

add that my father ruled my brother and sisters with the 
same iron rod j the only difference was, it could not rule me, 
and therefore I was not to be endured. Let one instance 
of his ferocity suffice — one which happened several years 
after this, when he was residing in London. 

It was his custom to appropriate a room in the house to 
the conservation of those things he loved, — choice wines, 
foreign preserves, cordials. This sanctum sanctorum was 
a room on the ground floor, under a skylight. Our next- 
door neighbour's pastime happened to be a game of balls, 
when one of them lodged on the leaded roof of this con- 
secrated room. Two of my sisters, of the ages of fourteen 
and sixteen, though, in appearance, they were women, ran 
from the drawing-room back- window to seek for the ball ; 
and slipping on the leads, the younger fell through the sky- 
light, on the bottles and jars upon the table below. She 
was dreadfully bruised, and her hands, legs, and face were 
cut ; so much so, that she still retains the scars. Her sister 
gave the alarm. My mother w T as called ; she went to the 
door of the storeroom ; her child screamed out, for God's 
sake to open the door, — she was bleeding to death. She con- 
tinued to scream, while my mother endeavoured to comfort 
her, but dared not break the lock, as my father had pro- 
hibited any one from entering this, his blue chamber ; and, 
what was worse, he had the key. Other keys were tried, 
but none could open the door. Had I been there, my foot 
should have picked the lock. Will it be believed that, in 
that state, my sister was compelled to await my father's 
return from the House of Commons, of which he was a 
member ? What an admirable legislator ! At last, when 
he returned, my mother informed him of the accident, and 
tried to allay the wrath which she saw gathering on his brow. 
He took no notice of her, but paced forward to the closet, 
where the delinquent, awed by his dreadful voice, hushed 
her sobs. He opened the door and found her there, scarcely 
able to stand, trembling and weeping. Without speaking a 
word, he kicked and cuffed her out of the room, and then 
gloomily decanted what wine remained in the broken bottles. 



18 



ADVENTURES OF 



CHAPTER VI. 



And now I'am in the world alone, 

Upon the wide, wide sea ; 
But why should I for others groan, 

When none will sigh for me ? Byron. 

There was some talk of my going to Oxford, as one of my 
uncles had livings in his gift, which my father could not, 
without pain, contemplate as property out of the family. I 
was consulted ; but the decided manner in which I declined 
priesthood^ left no hopes of my ever being guided by self- 
interest. 

Soon after this, I was taken to Portsmouth, and shipped 
on board a line-of- battle ship, the Superb, as passenger to 
join one of Nelson's squadron. She was commanded by 
Captain Keates ; and thence we sailed to Plymouth to take 
on board Admiral Duckworth, who hoisted his flag, and 
detained the ship three days to get mutton and potatoes from 
Cornwall. By this delay, we unfortunately fell in with the 
Nelson fleet off Trafalgar, two days after his deathless 
victory. 

Young as I was, I shall never forget our failing in with 
the Pickle schooner off Trafalgar, carrying the first de- 
spatches of the battle and death of its hero. We had 
chased her many hours out of our course, and but that our 
ship sailed well, and the wind was fresh, we should not 
have brought her to. Her commander, burning with im- 
patience to be the first to convey the news to England, 
was compelled, to heave to, and come on board us. Cap- 
tain Keates received him on the deck, and when he heard 
the news, I was by his side. Silence reigned throughout 
the ship ; some great event was anticipated ; the officers 
stood in groups, watching, with intense anxiety, the two 
commanders, who walked apart : battle, — Nelson, — 
ships, — were the only audible words which could be 
gathered from this conversation. I saw the blood rush 
into Keates's face ; he stamped the deck, walked hurriedly, 
and spoke as in a passion. I marvelled, for I had never 
before seen him much moved ; he had appeared cool, firm, 



A YOUNGER SON. JQ 

and collected on all occasions,, and it struck me that some 
awful event had taken place, or was at hand. 

The admiral was still in his cabin, eager for news from 
the Nelson fleet. He was an irritable and violent man 
and had been much incensed at the schooner's having dis- 
obeyed his signal, until she was compelled. After a few 
minutes, swelling with wrath, he sent an order to Keates ; 
who possibly heard it not, but staggered along the deck, 
struck to the heart by the news, and, for the first time in 
his life, forgot his respect to his superior in rank ; mut- 
tering, as it seemed, curses on his fate that, by the ad- 
miral's delay, he had not participated in the most glorious 
battle in naval history. Another messenger enforced him, 
such is discipline, to descend in haste to the admiral, who 
was high in rage and impatience. 

Keates, for I followed him, on entering the admiral's 
cabin, said, in a subdued voice, as if he w r ere choking : 
<c A great battle has been fought, tw r o days ago, off Tra- 
falgar. The combined fleets of France and Spain are 
annihilated, and Nelson is no more!" He then mur- 
mured, — " Had we not been detained, w T e should have 
been there. The captain of the schooner entreats you, 
Sir, not to detain him, and destroy his hopes, as you have 
destroyed ours." 

Duckworth answered not, conscience-struck, but stalked 
on deck. He seemed ever to avoid the look of his captain, 
and turned to converse with the commander of the 
schooner, who replied, in sulky brevity, " yes," or Ci no." 
Then dismissing him, he ordered all sail to be set, and 
walked the quarter-deck alone. A deathlike stillness per- 
vaded the ship, broken at intervals by the low murmurs 
of the crew and officers, when " battle" and cc Nelson," 
could alone be distinguished. Sorrow and discontent were 
painted on every face j and I sympathised in the feeling 
without a clear knowledge of the cause. 

On the following morning, we fell in with a portion of 
the victorious fleet. It was blowing a gale, and they 
lay wrecks on the sea. Our admiral communicated with 
them, and then joining Collingwood, had six sail of the 
line put under his command, with orders to pursue that 
c 2 



20 ADVENTURES OF 

part of the enemy's fleet which had escaped ; and I joined 
the ship to which I was appointed. It is unnecessary to 
dwell on the miseries of a cockpit life ; I found it more 
tolerable than my school, and little worse than my home. 
Besides, I was treated with exceeding kindness, and I 
began to be delighted with the profession. We returned 
to Portsmouth. The captain wrote to my father to know 
what he should do with me, as his ship was about to be 
paid off. My father, in his reply, determined not to have 
me at home, ordered that I should instantly be sent to 
Dr. Burney's navigation school. I was horror-stricken at 
this news, thinking I had done with schools ; and, sup- 
posing they were all like my former one, I anticipated a 
state of suffering. 

We had had a rough passage, being five or six sail of 
the line in company, some totally, and others partially 
dismasted. Our ship, having been not only dismasted, 
but razed by the enemy's shots (that is, the upper deck 
almost cut away), our passage home was boisterous.- 
The gallant ship, whose lofty canvass, a few days before, 
had fluttered almost amidst the clouds, as she bore down 
on the combined fleets, vauntingly called the Invincible, 
now, though her torn banner still waved aloft victorious, 
was crippled, jury-masted, and shattered, a wreck labouring 
in the trough of the sea, and driven about at the mercy of 
the wild waves and winds. With infinite toil and peril, 
amidst the shouts and reverberated hurrahs from suc- 
cessive ships, we passed on, towed into safe moorings at 
Spithead. 

What a scene of joy then took place. From the ship 
to the shore one might have walked on a bridge of boats, 
struggling to get alongside. Some, breathless with anxiety, 
eagerly demanded the fate of brothers, sons, or fathers, 
which was followed by joyous clasping and wringing of 
hands, and some returned to the shore, pale, haggard, and 
heart- stricken. Then came the extortionary Jew, chuck- 
ling with ecstacy at the usury he was about to realise 
from anticipated prize-money, proffering his gold with a 
niggard's hand, and demanding monstrous security and 
interest for his monies. Huge bumboats, filled with fresh 



A YOUNGER SON. 21 

provisions, and a circle of boats hung round us, crammed 
with sailors' wives, children, and doxies, thick as locusts. 
These last poured in so fast, that of the eight thousand 
said to belong at that period to Portsmouth and Gosport, 
I hardly think they could have left eight on shore. In a 
short period they seem to have achieved what the com- 
bined enemies' fleets had vauntingly threatened — to have 
taken entire possession of the Trafalgar squadron. I re- 
member, the following day, while the ship was dismant- 
ling, these scarlet sinners hove out the three first thirty- 
two pound guns ; I think there were not less than three 
or four hundred of them heaving at the capstan. 

Our captain, suffering from a severe wound, went on 
shore, and gave me, with two youngsters like myself, in 
very particular charge to one of the master's mates, who 
shortly after crossed over with us to Gosport. He had 
orders to convey us to Dr. Burney's. 



CHAPTER VII. 

If any person should presume to assert 
This story is not moral, first I pray, 
That they will not cry out before they 're hurt, Byron. 

Old Noah and his heterogeneous family felt not greater 
pleasure in setting their feet on terra firma than we did. 
The mate's face, which had been, by long habit of obe- 
dience and command, settled into a wooden sort of gravity, 
now relaxed, and became animated as a merry-andrew's. 
Looking about as if he had taken entire possession of the 
island, and as if he considered it treason and blasphemy 
in any of his subjects to appear malecontent, he turned 
sharply to me, and said, " Holla ! my lad, what's the 
matter? Why, you are as chap-fallen as if it was Sun- 
day, and the prayer-bell was ringing. You don't take 
me for that lubberly school ^mastering parson on board, 
do you ? " 

c 3 



22 ADVENTURES OP 

He had nearly hit it. The accursed school had crossed 
my mind, and I guessed he was taking us there. How- 
ever, I said nothing, and he continued, " Never go to 
church on shore or in soundings. At sea can't help it 
sometimes. Besides, then there is something to pray for 
- — fair weather and prize-money — don't want to pray 
for any thing on shore. Come, my lads, keep a sharp 
look-out for the Crown and Anchor. It should be some- 
where in these latitudes, if it has not driven or slipped its 
moorings/' 

'* A reprieve ! " thought I ; " he has forgotten the 
school, and we are bound to the tavern ! " I stepped out 
like an unbitted colt as I descried the glittering crown 
swinging over a tavern-door. I pointed it out, and he 
was just taking us in, when he suddenly stopped, and 
rubbing his brow, said, " Hold fast, my lads ! Let me 
see — let me see — did 'nt the captain tell me to — to — 
take these lads — to — • where the devil is it ? I say, 
lads, where are you to go ? " 

2; Go ! " we repeated. 

" Ay, I was ordered to take you somewhere. Damned 
odd you don't know, and I can't remember. O, ay, I 
have it ! — to Dr. — somebody at Gosport. Ay, ay, I've 
heard of the fellow. Remember they, would have sent 
me there once- — too sharp for 'em —-keep too good a look- 
out — not such a lubber as that comes to. But must 
obey orders — humph ! — but I've liberty now — not 
under the pennant — do as I like. Well, lads, what do 
you say ? Will you go to the school, or — come, you're 
looking round the offing, as if you were thinking of cut- 
ting and running ! " — (which was indeed true.) " Well, 
my lads, we can talk over this with a glass of grog. Lots 
of time — I've three days' liberty! So, if you obey 
orders, why I sha'n't disobey mine, if I see your names 
entered on the doctor's books before I report myself on 
board. So heave a-head, my lads ! " 

On the waiter's showing us into a room, bustling about, 
and waiting for orders, our commodore asked us what we 
would have, and, turning to the waiter, who was stirring 
'die fire, vociferated, " What a dust vou are kicking up ! 



A YOUNGER SON. 



23 



If you don't bring some grog to clear our coppers, I'll see 
if a kick a-atern won't freshen your way. Hold fast !" 
stopping him. " Come, my lads, don't you feel the land 
wind getting into your orlop deck ? Has it struck seven 
bells?" 

" No, Sir/' said the waiter ; " it's only ten o'clock." 

" No matter ; let's have some grub." 

" What would you like, Sir ? — very nice cold round 
of beef and ham in the house." 

" No, no ! What, do you want to give us the scurvy, 
you lubberly scoundrel ? '' 

" Would you like a cutlet, Sir, or beef steak ? " 

C( Ay, ay, that will do. Come, why don't you move 
your stumps, you landsman. — Hold fast ! Can't you 
grill some fowls ? " 

" Yes, Sir, there's a nice chicken in the larder." 

<< D — n your chicken ! Griii a hen-coop full of fowls, 
I say, and be quick. And mind, if they ar'n't here in 
five minutes, tell Mother — what d'ye call her ? — the 
landlady, I'll come and grill her. Well, why don't you 
move ? Hold fast ! — why, where the devil is the grog ? 
, — ordered it an hour ago." He then shyed his gold- 
laced cocked hat, and drove the waiter out of the room. 

After a monstrous meal, diluted with an unsparing hand, 
ships and schools clear out of our memory, we all sallied 
out, our pilot taking us into a variety of shops, in every 
one of which he ordered something, or made some purchase, 
and told us to take any thing we wanted, for he would 
pay for it, observing that these fellows knew him, and 
would not humbug him as they would us. He made a 
point of penetrating into their little back-parlours, to see 
their wives and daughters, and get a glass of grog. 

During this cruize, as he called it, he invited every 
messmate, as well as every person he had seen before, to 
dine with him at two o'clock at the tavern ; and he made 
appointments with all the young women of his acquaint- 
ance, which were not a few, ordering them to go home, 
like good girls, sweep the decks, put their cabins in order, 
clean themselves, meet him at the theatre, and tell their 
mothers to see their case-bottles properly filled, — no 
c 4 



24? ADVENTURES OP 

marines among them, — with plenty of grog in their 
lockers. He then, for he was very provident and system- 
atic in his arrangements, went to the theatre, engaged 
two or three boxes, and returned to the Crown and Anchor, 
complaining of his " dry duty/' 

His straggling acquaintances were soon dropping in. 
Wild, rough, and unruly were their greetings. The din- 
ner came, and the viands miraculously vanished. The 
bottles flew about, the empty dishes were cleared away, 
and dried fruit, and wines of all kinds, with sundry cut- 
glass bottles of brandy, hollands, shrub, and rum, gar- 
nished the board. Toasts, songs, and un clerical jests 
wended away the time, till our methodical master's mate, 
who was president, said, — 

" Ye sea- whelps, stopper your jaw, or I'll hand ye, 
youngsters, over to the doctor ; — you understand me ! 
Now, my hearties, what say you to a turn-out ? It's time 
for the play ; and you know to church and play-houses 
w r e must go sober — - in respect to parsons and ladies. 
It's unofScer-rike to get drunk before sunset ; it's not cor- 
rect, and I shan't allow it. So, come, I've only one more 
toast to give, — then I hoist the blue-peter, and you must 
consider yourselves under sailing orders." Here he was 
interrupted by the noise in the room. ee Silence ! I say ; 
now, gentlemen, fill your glasses ! No heeltaps, for I 
am going to give a solemn toast. I am very sorry to ob- 
serve that, from the neglect of duty of these lubberly 
landsmen, there's nothing but marines and bottoms on the 
table. Therefore, I command that you all gripe a marine 
by the stock, and prepare to break their necks." The 
waiter remonstrated, and begged the president to spare 
the bottles. " Lads ! " he vociferated, " a mutiny ! Stand 
by your commanding officer ! Waiter, go below, — leave 
the quarter-deck. Oh, you wo'nt? Now, lads, one — 
two — and when I say — three, remember that is your 
target," — pointing to the waiter, " and break his neck ! " 

The scared serving-man withdrew at the critical instant, 
and every empty bottle was smashed against the door. 
The memory of Nelson was then pledged, and we all 
sallied into the High-street. I thought the air was im- 



A YOUNGER SON. 25 

pregnated with alcohol, for, when I got out, 1 felt the 
first symptoms of drunkenness. 

I remember nothing mere of the theatre than that the 
audience was exclusively composed of sailors and their 
female companions. Had the great bell of St. Paul's been 
sounding, instead of the tinkling music between the acts, 
it would not have been heard. About midnight we supped 
in the same manner we had dined, and again turned out. 
Watchmen, dockyard-men, and red coats were assaulted 
wherever we fell in with them. The master's mate, not- 
withstanding the enormous quantity of liquors of all sorts 
contained in his body, had a head no more affected by 
them than the wooden bung of a rum-puncheon. But 
this being my first drunken bout, I cannot say I saw very 
clearly ; for the houses appeared to roll and pitch like 
ships. Neither could 1 walk very well, for in the broadest 
street I broke my shins against the curbstones on each 
side of the way. As I grounded on every tack I made, 
beating it up, I thought the street had neither beginning 
nor end. But the master's mate kept stragglers together, 
till we arrived at what he called head- quarters. He 
there entrusted me and the two others into the custody 
of a fiery-faced, flaming, old harridan, with strict in- 
junctions regarding her treatment of us; to which she 
replied she would take as much care of us as of her own 
children. In the mean while, he went out to survey the 
coast, promising to return, and ordering a bed, a warm- 
ing-pan, a red herring, and a bowl of punch, to be all in 
readiness by his return. 

Our careful, obedient, and moral hostess, with more 
than a mother's care, ordered a bed to be prepared for 
each of us striplings, mixed each of us a glass of strong 
waters, and then, sagely observing that late hours were 
bad for young blood, led me to bed first. She put one of 
her own caps on my head, tied it under my chin with a 
blue riband, closed the curtains, called me a sweet creature, 
tucked me up, slobbered my cheek, and parted from me 
with — " Be a good boy, now; and mind you say your 
prayers before you go to sleep ! " 

About daylight, I woke from unquiet and suffocating 



26 



ADVENTURES OF 



dreams. Had I been previously acquainted with that 
phantom, the night-mare, I might have imagined myself 
under its influence; but my astonishment was great to 
find myself in my small couch. While endeavouring to 
distinctly recollect how I got there, the maid of the tene- 
ment appeared, and the mystery was solved. 

After some delay in procuring the necessaries for a 
morning ablution, I dressed ; and, directed by the mate's 
well-known voice, entered the parlour, ashamed, foolish, 
and dreading his rebukes, not knowing, or not then con- 
sidering him as the cause. 

Though he was very methodical, he was no methodist, 
at least in preaching. His and their practice may be near 
akin. There he sat, like an emperor, or Abyssinian 
prince, (according to Bruce,) his august person occupying 
the old hostess's honoured arm-chair, and in exclusive 
possession of the fire. Cups, saucerless and chipped, a 
handless teapot, a piece of salt butter wrapped in brown 
paper, sugar on a broken plate, and soddened buttered- 
toast, half eaten, and tooth-marked, were scattered about, 
with fat of ham and sausage. 

These my first sins ought to find a place in my last will 
and testament ; but to whom am I to bequeath them ? 
to my father ? the captain ? or the master's mate ? Surely 
the most malicious enemy can never cast in my teeth what 
I committed at about twelve years old. 

A day or two after this, our master's mate conducted us 
to school, and delivered us over in precise terms. The 
schoolmaster was so pleased with his modest carriage and 
address, as to ask him to dinner. He excused himself, 
under the plea of ship-duty, and returned, I suppose, to 
"head-quarters;" not, however, before he had slipped 
a couple of guineas into each of our hands, which he 
wrung heartily, telling us to apply to him for any thing 
we wanted, and to say nothing to the old hunkses about 
the past. Thus we lost sight of him for ever. 



A YOUNGER SON, 



27 



CHAPTER VIII. 

A barren soil, where nature's germs, confined, 

To stern sterility can stint the mind ; 

Whose thistle well betrays the niggard earth, 

Emblem of all to whom the land gives birth. 

Each geni?l influence nurtured to resist, 

A land of meanness, sophistry, and mist. Byron*. 

Many of the boys in the school, like myself, had been 
to sea. There were considerably more than a hundred. 
It was understood that I was only to remain there until 
appointed to a ship. 

One circumstance alone connected with this school lives 
freshly in my memory. Captain Morris had given me 
a letter to forward to my father ; and, on my way to the 
post- office, I was accompanied by a schoolfellow, a lad of 
about sixteen, who had been two years at sea. He asked 
to look at the letter, handled it, felt something, peeped into 
it, and exclaimed, iC A prize, by Jove ! " He inquired 
who had given it to me, and upon hearing that it came 
from the captain, instantly guessed at its contents. " O ! 
then," said he, ie it is a balance of the money your father 
gave him for you. Why, you won't be such a greenhorn 
as to send it, will you ? " 

I answered, cc Certainly ! " 

(e Lord ! what nonsense!" he continued, "it is your 
own ! And with this you can get everything you want." 

Then he jeered me for being pennyless ; and went on 
till I began to reflect on my father's niggardliness, and 
that I might never meet with such another opportunity. I 
listened to his argument, that at any rate I had a right to 
a portion of the money, because a boy ought to have 
money in his pocket. While talking, he broke the seal, 
and cried out, " See, it is open by accident, quite by 
accident ; and here is the money ! ** A sight of the 
enclosure, as he foresaw, was more effective than his 
oratory. The sum was indeed a very small one, though I 
thought it inexhaustible. By my comrade's kind assistance 



28 ADVENTURES OF 

it was quickly expended, my share being swallowed up in 
the purchase of a gun, powder, and shot; he had the 
larger portion. 

The ensuing morning we went out a birding. My 
companion let me have the first shot, and then, as we had 
agreed to fire alternately, I gave him the gun. Here I was 
foiled, for he insisted on retaining the gun. I entreated 
him to let me have my turn, but in vain ; I taxed him 
with his breach of word, and murmured that it was my 
gun : upon which the muzzle of the gun was pointed at 
me, and I was kicked. Thus we went on, till weary of 
finding nothing to kill, or, which is the same, being unable 
to kill anything, towards noon we were both hungry, 
when he ordered me to part with my last crown to buy 
refreshment from a farm-house. There was no choice \ 
he, with the gun, was my master. After this, growing 
insolent, his commands were, that I should put up my 
hat for him to have a shot at it. I at first refused ; but 
he swore that he would permit me to have the second fire 
at my own hat, and then, if I did not put as many shot 
in it as he did, I was to lose the crown. To this I agreed ; 
he fired, and gave me the gun loaded. The instant it was 
in my hand, I pointed it, not at my hat, but at the hat on 
his head, exclaiming, " Hat for hat ! " and pulled the 
trigger. He looked aghast, and screamed out, " You'll 
shoot me!" I told him I intended as much, and snapped 
again. It was not primed. Luckily his cunning for once 
saved his life. He ran off; I primed the gun and fol- 
lowed him ; he had got forty or fifty yards a-head ; when, 
as he was jumping a hedge, I stopped and fired. He 
fell ; and my rage instantly turned into sorrow. He lay 
on his face, shrieking out he was killed. I put the gun 
down, which was now offensive to his sight, and went up 
to him. He was dreadfully frightened, and a little hurt, 
begging me not to do him further harm, and declaring he 
should die. Good luck had directed the shot exactly to the 
part where he merited the birch. On repeated assurances 
that he was not much hurt, I persuaded him to let me 
lead him home. Before he arrived at the school he was 
much better. He then complained to the master, contrary 



A YOUNGER SON. 29 

to the terms I had bound him to by oath. The master, 
without appealing to me, laid a deodand on the gun, and 
placed me under confinement. 

At the expiration of two' days I was sent for, lectured, 
and informed that a letter from my father directed my 
being sent on board a frigate then fitting for sea. On the 
following morning I went on board. We went to sea in 
a few days, and cruized off Havre-de- Grace. The captain 
was intimately acquainted with my family. He was a 
red-gilled, sycophantic Scotchman, the son of an attorney, 
and had bowed and smirked himself into the notice of 
royalty. His first lieutenant was a Guernseyman, a 
low-bred, mean-spirited, malicious scoundrel, who disliked 
all who were better than himself, — and that was every one. 
However, there was a fine set of boys for my messmates, 
so that the time passed on tolerably well at first. Yet I 
now saw the navy was not suited to me. The captain 
being entrusted with unlimited power, it depended on his 
humours to make a heaven or hell of his ship. I was no 
studier of men's humours, no truckler to those in power ; 
consequently I was hated. I was soon dissatisfied, and 
longed for freedom. Then, in the navy, I had looked for- 
ward to active service and fighting ; here was none, nor 
the probability of any, while many told me they had been 
all their lives at sea, without seeing a shot fired. In short, 
the battle of Trafalgar seemed the last act of naval war- 
fare, and old Duckworth's passion for Cornish mutton and 
potatoes had prevented my initiation into the profession 
with glory, which might have urged me to persevere. 

Nothing is so slavish and abject as the deportment of 
junior officers on board a man-of-war. You must not 
even look at your superior with discontent. Your hat 
must be ever in your hand, bowing in token of sub- 
mission to all above you. Then, if the captain or any 
of the lieutenants happen to dislike you, so utterly are 
you in their power, that existence becomes scarcely en- 
durable. How much soever you may be in the right, 
it matters not ; for your superiors, like majesty, can do 
no wrong, and opposition is fruitless. 

This may be necessary to the effective discipline of the 



SO ADVENTURES OF 

navy or not. No one can deny it is an evil ; and this is 
certain, — that all, whilst in subordinate situations, complain 
of it as an evil, and resolve, when they possess the power, 
to remedy it. But good intentions, when the period 
arrives for executing them, are forgotten or no longer 
considered good. To make alterations is then called a 
dangerous innovation, a bad precedent, an impossibility. 
They expound their new creed in 'specious common-places : 
ce we must do as others do ; things go on well as they are ; 
it is presumption to attempt change :" thus glossing over 
their own natural desire to tyrannise in their turn, often 
strongest in those who have been most severely treated. 
They continue following the beaten track, and perpetuating 
a system, no. matter how corrupt ; and if they live only 
for themselves, they act, as the world calls it, prudently, 
if not wisely. As Bacon says of the ant, " It is a wise 
creature for itself, but a shrewd thing in an orchard or 
garden/' For every one opposes with hate every one that 
purposes an alteration, because it implies that every one 
has hitherto been in error, and, what is equally humiliating, 
has not been consulted. Reformers, in all ages, whatever 
has been their object, have been unpitied martyrs; and 
the multitude have evinced a savage exultation in their 
sacrifice. ei Let in the light upon a nest of young owls, 
and they cry out against the injury you have done them." 
Men of mediocrity are young owls : when you present 
them with strong and brilliant ideas, they exclaim against 
them as false, dangerous, and deserving of punishment : 
" Every abuse attempted to be reformed is the patrimony 
of those who have more influence than the reformers." 



A YOUNGER SON. SI 



CHAPTER IX. 

And from that hour did I, with earnest thought, 
Heap knowledge from forbidden mines of lore j 

Yet nothing that my tyrants knew or taught 
I cared to learn, but from that secret store 
Wrought linked armour for my soul, before 

It might walk forth to war among mankind. Shelley. 

Had it been optional, I would now have left the navy ; 
notwithstanding my passion for the sea was undiminished. 
I felt it was not in my nature to submit to a long appren- 
ticeship of servitude. Before I could possibly be a master, 
fourteen or more years might elapse ; and fourteen years 
then seemed to me a long life. From that time forward, 
I brooded exclusively on the possibility of breaking my 
indentures, and seeking my own fortunes, as tales and his- 
tories tell us people did in the olden times. But then my 
friendless situation, and ignorance of the world, appeared 
an effectual bar ; and still my neart yearned at the recol- 
lection of my mother, whom I then almost worshipped, 
and of my sisters. A thousand tender remembrances of 
early life clung to my heart ; while the continued perse- 
cution of my fate, long absence, neglect, and the memory of 
my stern and unforgiving father, made me of a desponding 
and unhappy disposition. But to continue my narrative. 

At this period of my life, an involuntary passion was 
awakened in my bosom for reading ; so that I seized on 
every occasion for borrowing and collecting books, and 
every leisure moment for reading them. Old plays, voy- 
ages, and travels were my principal study ; and I almost 
learned by heart Captain Bligh's Narrative of his Voyage 
to the South-sea Islands, and of the mutiny of his crew. 
Hi« partial account did not deceive me. I detested him 
for his tyranny, and Christian was my hero. I wished 
his fate had been mine, and longed to emulate him. It 
left an impression on my mind which has had a marked 
influence on my life. 

Our captain's clerk, seeing I had a good store of books, 
with no place to put tfeem in, thought they would be an 



32 ADVENTURES OF 

ornament to his cabin, for he never read. He proposed 
to take care of them for me, offering me the use of his 
cabin, where I might read them. I gladly acquiesced in 
what I, simple fool that I then was, thought a most kind 
offer ; and, for a few days, we got on very well together. 
One day I went for a book ; he was angry about something 
or nothing, and had the impudence to say, " You may read 
here if you like ; but I will not permit any books to be 
taken out of my cabin." 

Ci Are they not mine ? " I asked. 

" Not now;" he replied. 

(C What ! " I then asked, ' e do you intend to keep pos- 
session of my books ? " 

To this I received no other answer than, — " Come — 
none of your insolence j " 

Upon this I said, " Give me my books ; I will leave 
them here no longer, now I see your object." He dared 
me to touch them ; I snatched one from the shelf ; he 
struck me ; I returned the blow. It was then harmless 
as the unweaned colt's. 

My opponent was two or three and twenty, strong and 
thick-set; I a tall slim boy of fourteen. The presump- 
tion of my returning his blow so astonished his cowardly 
nature, that, for a moment, he hesitated what to do. But 
some of the youngsters had collected round the door, 
and cried out, " Well done, my boy ! " which incensed 
the paltry, dirty scrawler. He seized hold of me, and 
vociferating, " You young rascal, I will tame you !" gave 
me a blow with a ruler, which he broke over my head ; 
then jammed me up against the bulkhead, so that I could 
not escape, and belaboured me without mercy. As long as 
my strength lasted, I opposed him. The lookers-on were 
encouraging me, and exclaiming shame on him. My head 
grew dizzy from blows ; my mouth and nose were bleed- 
ing profusely ; my body was subdued, but not my spirit. 
I asked not for mercy, but defied him ; and on his attempt- 
ing to kick me out of the cabin, I increased his fury, by 
declaring I would not leave it till he had given me my 
books. We were thus contending, he to force me out, and 
I to remain in, when he kicked me in the stomach, and I 



A YOUNGER SON. 33 

lay motionless ; while he roared and sputtered, — <€ Get 
out, you rascal ! or I '11 knock the life out of you ! ** 

I felt I could no longer resist. I was in despair. The 
being beaten like a hound by a dastardly brute, and the 
insulting and triumphant language the fellow used, made 
me mad. My eye caught, by chance, something glittering 
close to me. The table was capsised, and a penknife within 
my grasp. The prospect of revenge renewed my strength. 
I seized it, and, repeating his words of knocking the life 
out of me, I added, as I held up the weapon, ce Coward ! 
look out for your own ! ** 

I was then on one knee, struggling to get up. On seeing 
the knife, and my wild look haggard with passion, the 
mender of pens shrunk back. After this, all I remember 
is, that I stabbed him in several places, and that he shut 
his eyes, held his hands up to his face, and screamed out 
in terror for mercy. Some one then called to me, with 
Ci Holloa! what are you at?" — I turned round, and re- 
plied, " This cowardly ruffian was beating me to death, 
and I have killed him !" — I then threw down the knife, 
took up my book, and walked out of the cabin. 

Presently a serjeant of marines was sent down, with an 
order to bring me on deck. The captain was there sur- 
rounded by his officers. He inquired of the first lieutenant 
what was the matter ; and the answer was, 

u This youngster went into your clerk's cabin, sir, with 
a carving knife, and has killed him/' 

The captain looked at me with horror, and, without 
asking a question, said, u Kill my clerk ; put the mur- 
derer in irons, and handcuff him. Kill my clerk!" — I 
attempted to speak ; but was stopped with, " Gag him ; 
Take him down below instantly. Not a word, sir ! Kill 
my clerk I" 

As the serjeant attempted to collar me, I said, " Hands 
off!" looked fiercely, for I now thought myself a man, 
and walked slowly down the hatchway. A sentinel was 
put over me, and the master-at-arms brought the irons. 
But, I suppose, the captain, by that time, bad heard a 
different version of the story; for a midshipman, named 
Murray, came down, and countermanded the manacling 

D 



34) ADVENTURES OP 

part of the sentence ; and then, addressed himself to me, 
said, iC Don't mind, they can't hurt you. We will tell the 
truth. You have acted like a man. Keep up your spirits/' 

' ( Never fear me ! " I replied. 

Some hours after, the captain came to me, and said, 
" Are you not ashamed of your conduct, sir ? " 

I answered, " No ! " 

" What, sir ! is that the way to answer me ? Get up, 
sir, and take off your hat." I told him I was waiting for 
the irons. I, however, stood up. 

" You will be hanged, sir, for murder ! " 

I replied, " I had rather be hanged, than kicked by 
your servants." 

« Why, are you mad, sir ? " 

ce Yes ! your ill-treatment has made me so. You, and 
your French lieutenant, are always punishing and abusing 
me without cause, and I will not submit to it. I came 
into the navy, an officer and a gentleman, and I am treated 
like a dog. Put me on shore ! I will do no more duty ; 
and I will allow neither you nor your domestics to abuse 
and beat me/' 

With that I advanced a step towards him, from what 
motive I know not. He seized me by the collar, and 
bade me sit down on the gun-carriage. " No!" I con- 
tended, " you told me never to sit down in your presence, 
and I will not ! " 

iC Will not ! " said he, holding me tightly, and nearly 
strangling me with his grasp. I could not speak, but put 
my hand up to release myself; upon which, repeating the 
words, " You will not ! " he gave me a violent blow in the 
face ; and I, with another " No ! " had the audacity to spit 
in his. 

His flushed brow turned from deep scarlet to almost 
black in an instant. He could not articulate a word ; but, 
dashing me from him with all his might, turned into his 
cabin, choking with rage. Many of the officers, particu- 
larly the midshipmen, had gathered round. — I got up 
from the gun-carriage on which I had fallen. Two of my 
messmates c«me up to me and said, " Well done, my lad, 
don't be afraid." 



A YOUNGER SON. 35 

" Do I look so ?" was my reply. 

At sunset,, I was told I might go below ; but I was 
never to show myself on deck. I never saw the gorbellied 
Scotch captain afterwards. 

All the rest of the cruise was holiday to me. I got my 
books,, and endeavoured, by reading, to make up for my 
want of education. The clerk recovered, and, though he 
took care to give me a wide berth, when obliged to pass 
near me, I was malicious enough to say, pointing to a 
large scar on his cheek, " Though you are a clerk, don't 
cabbage books, or kick a gentleman.' , He was the son of 
our noble captain's tailor, and his preferment was a Scotch 
devise to pay his father's bill. 



CHAPTER X. 

The ocean with its vastness, its blue green, 
Its ships, its rocks, its caves, its hopes, its fears, 
Its voice mysterious, which whoso hears 

Must think on what will be, or what has been. Keats. 

On our return to an English port, I was drafted on board 
a guard-ship at Spithead ; and, without hearing a word 
from my father, was shortly redrafted on board a sloop of 
war. Though young, I had pride enough to forbear 
useless remonstrances, or whining complaints, and philoso- 
phy enough to endure. From my childhood I had been 
inured to commands forced upon me, so I tried to look 
with indifference, and knitted my brows to stifle my 
emotions. 

Hitherto I had at least been consigned into the hands 
of men who knew my family ; but now I was suddenly 
drafted into a ship where all were utter strangers, without 
money, and ill provided with necessaries. For I was not 
a €C carefu* prudent bairn," as a Scotch midshipman was, 
whose parents had sent him to sea, with a very small sup- 
ply of clothes for his back, but with a head crammed with 



36 



ADVENTURES OP 



Scotch maxims, such as "a bawbee saved is a bawbee 
got," and " mony a little makes a mickle." This haggis- 
fed, sandy-haired sharper had extracted most of my traps 
out my chest on board the guard-ship, in which I was in- 
carcerated till appointed to a ship. Some one detecting 
him with a bundle of stray articles, old tooth brushes, bits 
of soap, foul linen, &c, in the act of depositing them in 
his bag, asked him what he was at ; and he replied, " Anly 
picking up the wee things about the deck/' This Cale- 
donian lurcher had the effrontery to confess he had three 
or four dozen of shirts with every one a different mark ; 
the scoundrel having pilfered thirty or forty boys. He 
had too much prudence, I too little. No one troubled 
himself to inquire into my wants, and to sea I went again 
in a sloop of war. 

We proceeded to Cadiz, Lisbon, South America, and 
the coast of Africa. We Were eighteen months absent, 
and had visited the four quarters of the world ; so that I 
picked up a little practical geography whilst going over 
thirty thousand miles. 

Our commander was a surveying captain, a little, pert, 
pragmatical fellow ; and, like most little fellows, thought 
himself a very great man. The only thing I can remem- 
ber of ithis small commander is, that he used to twist and 

s 
screw his h%d aside to look up at me, and snarl ; and 

then, with words too big to find utterance from his diminu- 
tive mouth, shrilly say, " You overgrown monster, you 
logger-headed fellow, without nerve or feeling, what are 
you idling here for, instead of attending to my com- 
mands ? " 

He hated me because I was framed like a man, and I 
despised him because he so little resembled one. Some- 
times he would jump on a carronade slide to box the men's 
heads. 

As, in after life, I revisited most of the world in detail, 
with expanded faculties and awakened feelings, I shall not 
narrate my puerile detail of events. I loathe the prattle 
of talkative gawky boys, and mothers' talented darlings ; 
it is as irksome as a dedication in the " Spectator/ or as 
Addison's drunkenly inspired, mawkish, moral papers. 



A YOUNGER SON. ST 

On returning to England, our circumnavigating com- 
mander communicated with my father ; who, nothing 
softened by time, therefore harder than stone or iron, re- 
issued his high and abhorred behest that I should be re- 
drafted into another ship, fitting out for the East Indies. 

We were soon ready for sea. Who can paint in words 
what I felt. Imagine me torn from my native country, 
destined to cross the wide ocean to a wild region, cut oil 
from every tie, or possibility of communication, transported 
like a felon as it were for life, for, at that period, few ships 
returned under seven or more years. I was torn away, not 
seeing my mother, or brother, or sisters, or one familiar 
face ; no voice to speak a word of comfort, or to inspire 
me with the smallest hope that any thing human took an 
interest in me. Had a servant of our house, nay, had the 
old mastiff, the companion of my childhood, come to me 
for one hour, I could have hugged him for joy, and my 
breast would have been softened to parental love instead of 
hardening indifference. From that period, my affections, 
imperceptibly, were alienated from my family and kindred, 
and sought the love of strangers in the wide w r orld. 
Again, to be separated from my messmates, whom I had 
learnt to love - — these are things which some may feel, but 
none can delineate. The invisible spirit which bore me 
up, under such a w r eight of sorrows, is still a mystery, 
even now that my passions are subdued by reason, time, 
or exhaustion. The intense fire which burned in my 
brain is extinguished, leaving no trace but the deep lines 
prematurely stamped on my brow. Yet even now the 
mere memory of what I suffered rekindles the flame, and 
I burn with indignation. 

I could no longer conceal from myself the painful con- 
viction that I was an utter outcast ; that my parent had 
thrust me from his threshold, in the hope that I should 
not again cross it. My mother's intercessions (if indeed 
she made any) were unavailing : I was left to shift for 
myself. The only indication of my» father's considering 
he had still a duty to perform towards me, was in an 
annual allowance, to which either his conscience or his 
pride impelled him. Perhaps, having done this, he said, 
d 3 



38 ADVENTURES OF 

with other good and prudent men, — " I have provided 
for my son. If he distinguishes himself, and returns, as 
a man, high in rank and honour, I can say, — he is my 
son, and I made him what he is ! His daring and fear- 
less character may succeed in the navy." He left me to 
my fate, with as little remorse as he would have ordered a 
litter of hlind puppies to be drowned. 

Forced from England in this friendless state, I was sick 
and sad ; every thing in prospect being gloomy, even in 
imagination. Notwithstanding my extreme youth, my 
buoyant spirit, my naturally sanguine disposition, I could 
see no bright spot to lure me on to the smallest hope of 
brighter days. 

We had been at sea two or three days, when the cap- 
tain, who was angry with one of the lieutenants, turned 
round to me, being in the same watch, and said, <s You 
had better take care of yourself here ; and remember, I 

have heard from Captain A of the atrocity you were 

guilty of in his ship/' I replied, ee I was guilty of 
none." 

(C What ! " he continued, for he wanted to expend the 
remnant of his passion on some one more helpless than a 
commissioned officer, <c What, sir ! do you think stabbing 
people is nothing ? I will convince you to the contrary ; 
and the very first complaint I hear of you, I '11 turn you 
out of the ship." This threat of vengeance, as to get on 
shore was the height of my most ardent longings, made 
me smile. He perhaps considered it contempt, and turned 
away with anger. 

But I soon found out he was not a bad man — merely 
a weak and choleric one. He had been many years on 
half-pay, and, brought up in the country, he had imbibed 
a farmer's taste for dirt and dung, which his naval pro- 
fession had interrupted, but not erased. During the long 
interval which had elapsed from his promotion to the com- 
mand of a ship, he resumed the natural bent of his inclin- 
ations, by setting to, in right good earnest, as a cultivator 
of his paternal soil ; and felt more pride in viewing his 
fat hogs and sheep, and ploughing ground for his Swedish 
turnips, than ploughing the Indian sea in a dashing frigate. 



A YOUNGER SON. 39 

His appointment to her was an honour unsought ; for an 
honourable member of his family, in the Admiralty, scan*, 
dalised at his degenerate occupations, officiously thrust 
greatness upon him, by ordering him on service. 

He reluctantly left what he could not take with him, — 
his house and lands ; he wept over his child and its 
mother ; and his heart almost burst with emotion on con- 
templating the glorious and magnificent mountain of the 
richest compost he was compelled to leave behind. As 
for the live stock, pigs, sheep, and poultry, it was too 
painful to be separated from them, after having expended 
more time, money, and patience on their nurture and edu- 
cation, than most parents do on their children; so he 
brought them on board with him, and the ship's resem- 
blance to a farm -yard was to him a source of delight. 
Most of his time was occupied with these his adopted 
children ; and the first lieutenant was left in charge of 
the ship, with only one little check to his pleasure, — that 
of receiving a portion of the ill-humour, which vented it- 
self on the quarter-deck, in abuse of the officers, whenever 
our farmer- captain was irritated by some mishap to his 
live stock, such as must arise in blowing weather, from 
sickness, death, and broken limbs. On the whole, we, the 
midshipmen, used to annoy him more than he annoyed 
us. One of our tricks, I remember, was, to run a fine 
needle into the brain of a fowl or two every night, when, 
their bodies being ordered to be thrown overboard, on the 
supposition that they had died of disease, we used to be 
on the look-out to save them, and a grill was our reward. 
He was, in the usual sense of the phrase, a good sort of 
man ; that is, neither good enough, nor bad enough for 
any thing; and it was equally impossible to iove him^ 
respect him,, hate him, or despise him. 



40 ADVENTURES OP 



CHAPTER XI. 



Rock'd in his cradle by the roaring wind, 

The tempest-born in body and in mind, 

His young eyes opening on the ocean foam, 

Had from that moment deem'd the deep his home. Byron. 



Having fully made up my mind to quit the navy, I paid 
some attention to my duty. I began to study drawing 
and navigation, read every thing I could lay my hand on, 
and collected from the officers and sailors every inform- 
ation regarding India and her countless islands. We 
went in the old tract : touched at St. Helena, and the 
Cape of Good Hope, and, without any thing remarkable 
anchored in the harbour of Bombay. 

The only circumstance connected with my after-history, 
which I have occasion to relate here, is, that I formed, 
during my passage, a lasting friendship with the junior 
lieutenant, Aston. I had been in his watch, and, through 
the tedious nights, he had dived into my real character, 
so as to discover that I was not what I seemed to be. 
His kindness had drawn me out from the shell in which I 
shrunk, when strangers, who appeared as enemies to me, 
drew near. He awakened those feelings which had be- 
come torpid, and called others forth that I had never felt. 
He became my champion with those above me. 

One circumstance had, he told me, often impressed him 
with admiration, considering my youth. On our passage, 
a second lieutenant, a keen, sharp, cunning, and villanous 
Scotchman, whose sole delight was in torturing those he 
commanded, when questioning me one day on a point of 
duty, said : ec When you address me, sir, tak off your 
hat!" 

I replied, " I have saluted you as I do the captain, in 
putting my hand to my hat." 

He then came up to me, with — " Tak your hat off, 
sir, whilst you address your superior ! " 



A YOUNGER SON. 41 

iC 1 have none." 

<: What, sir, am I not your superior officer ? " 

e * Yes, sir, — you are that." 

<e Well, then, why don't you tak your hat off?" 

ee I never do, sir." 

" Off wi' your hat, sir ! " exalting his voice. 

" No, I will not." 

"What! will net?" 

€i No, — to no one hut God \" — and then recollecting 
I had done so to the king, I added, — ic and the king ! " 

This parasite considered (at least one would think so, 
by the use he made of it) that the only utility of a hat was 
to be pointed, as an index of his base grovelling nature, to 
the ground, not as a covering for the head. Though he 
had bowed and fawned himself into the good graces of the 
captain, his complaint could not be comprehended, when 
he accused me of mutinous disobedience of orders. His 
rage, in this instance, being rendered impotent, he re- 
venged himself by heaping on me a greater portion of 
petty spites, which I treasured in my memory, to be 
summed up and paid. I did so, and with interest. 

Another occurrence, admired by Aston, happened while 
coasting between Madras and Bombay on the pirate coast 
of Goa. A suspicious-looking vessel, having tried all 
day to avoid us, got becalmed, and three boats were 
ordered to board her. I was sent in the one commanded 
by the Scotch lieutenant. She was the fastest pulling 
boat, and the best manned and armed. Aston was in 
the next best boat, and kept in our wake. The supposed 
pirate craft keeping sweeping towards the land; and, 
as it appeared, from the ship, we could not come up to her 
till she run on shore, and a light breeze springing up, 
besides the general orders of the navy in India to destroy, 
but not to board the Malay pirates, the frigate fired a gun 
and hoisted the recal-pennant. We were then within two 
gun-shots of the craft ; she had got inside the reefs, and 
the armed natives were crowding down to the beach. On 
the signal-gun's being heard by our boat, the lieu tenant de- 
clared we must return, and ordered the men to lie on their 
oars till Aston 's cutter came alongside, whom he hailed, and 



4*2 ADVENTURES OP 

said : cc Aston, you see the recai-signal — we maun return 
to the ship." 

Aston answered, ce What signal ! — I don't see it." 

" If you look, you will/' said the lieutenant. 

<c I don't intend to look/' was the next reply. " We 
were ordered to see what craft that is ; and I shall do so. 
Give way, my lads ! " 

I requested Aston to lay on his oars a moment, and 
then, turning to the Scotchman, I asked, respectfully, if 
he were going on, as I was steering the barge. He said 
" No ! " and ordered me to return to the ship. On this I 
let go the tiller and jumped overboard, and, calling to 
Aston to pick me up, swam to his boat. The lieutenant, 
with the snarl of a hyena, said., " I shall report your con- 
duct, sir ! " 

Aston ordered his men to pull in shore ! and in ten 
minutes we were on board the Malay. I was in the bow 
of the boat, on fire to realise my ardent love of fighting ; 
and, the instant our boat touched the bow of the Malay, I 
swung myself on board, by seizing a rope with one hand, 
when, before my foot was on the deck, I cut a fellow across 
the head ; and then, followed by two or three sailors, we 
cut and slashed away without mercy. The Malays jumped 
overboard. I was so heated as not to observe whether 
they resisted or not ; but, excited by my own violence, 
and furious at any of them escaping, I thought of our fire- 
arms, seized a musket, and was about to fire at a fellow in 
the water, when Aston laid hold of me, and exclaimed, 
" Don't you hear ? I have been roaring to you till I 'm 
hoarse. Why, what are you at ? Are you mad — your 
example has made all my men so. Put down the musket. 
You have no right to touch these people." 

I inquired, in surprise, if she was not a Malay. Ci How 
can I tell," he replied, " what she is ? You should have 
waited for my orders. Perhaps she is a harmless country 
vessel." 

I then began to imagine I had been too precipitate, too 
rash; and my ardour was cooled in thinking I might 
have compromised Aston. It was therefore with inex- 
pressible delight that I beheld the savages on the beach 



A YOUNGER SON. 43 

open a fire from matchlocks on us, and saw them launching 
their canoes full of armed people. However, while they 
were delayed in picking up their countrymen, we scuttled 
the craft, leaped into our boats, and the frigate, having 
stood in, picked us up. Two of the wounded Malays 
Aston took with him. 

After the skirmish I tried to appease Aston's anger by 
my coolness and activity ; so that, having lectured me, he 
represented my conduct in such favourable terms to the 
first lieutenant, that the Scotchman's account obtained 
nothing worse for me than a simple reprimand. He now 
detested me ; but, under the protection of Aston's wing, 
I was safe. Besides, his pusillanimity was a source of 
ridicule ; and the sailors, who all look on courage as the 
highest attribute, applauded me. 



CHAPTER XII. 



Long in misery 
I wasted, ere in one extremest fit- 
I plunged for life or death. Keats. 

Before this, I had gained respect in the ship by a 
reckless daring. My indifference and neglect of all the 
ordinary duties were in some degree tolerated, owing to 
my unwearied diligence and anxiety in every case of 
difficulty, danger, or sudden squalls. In the Indian seas 
a squall is not to be trifled with ; when the masts are 
bending like fishing-rods, the light sails fluttering in 
ribands, the sailors swinging to and fro on the bow, bent 
yards, the ship thrown on her beam-ends, the wild roar of 
the sea and wind, and no other light than the red and 
rapid lightning. Then I used to rouse myself from dozing 
on the carronade- slide, springing aloft ere my eyes were 
half open, when the only reply to Aston's trumpet was my 
voice. I felt at home amidst the conflict of the elements. 



44 ADVENTURES OF 

It was a kind of war ; and harmonised with my feelings. 
The more furious the storm, the greater my delight. My 
contempt of the danger insured my safety ; while the 
solemn and methodical disciplinarians, who prided them- 
selves on the exact performance of their separate duties at 
their respective stations, beheld with astonishment the 
youngster, whom they were always abusing for neglect of 
duty, voluntarily thrusting himself into every arduous and 
perilous undertaking, ere they could decide on the pos- 
sibility or prudence of its being attempted. The sailors 
liked me for this, and prognosticated I should yet turn out 
a thorough sailor. Even the officers, who had hitherto 
looked on me as a useless idler, viewed my conduct with 
gaping wonder, and entertained better hopes of me. 

But these hopes died away with the bustling scenes in 
which they were begotten ; and, during the fine and calm 
weather, I lost the reputation I had acquired in storms 
and battles. Among my messmates I was decidedly a 
favourite. What I principally prided myself in was pro- 
tecting the weak from the strong. I permitted none to 
tyrannise. I had grown prematurely very tall and strong ; 
and was of so unyielding a disposition, that in my struggles 
with those, who were not much more than my equals in 
strength, though above me in years, I wore them out with 
pertinacity. My rashness and impetuosity bore down all 
before them. None liked to contend with me; for I 
never acknowledged myself beaten, but renewed the quar- 
rel, without respect to time or place. Yet what my 
messmates chiefly lauded and respected, was the fearless 
independence with which I treated those above me. 

The utmost of their power had been wreaked against 
me ; yet, had the rack been added, they could not hav^j 
intimidated me. Indeed, from very wantonness, I went 
beyond their inflictions. For instance, the common punish- 
ment was sending us to the mast-head for four or five 
hours. Immediately I was ordered thither, I used to lie 
along the cross-trees, as if perfectly at my ease, and either 
feign to sleep, or, if it was hot, really go to sleep. They 
were alarmed at the chance of my falling from so hazard- 
ous a perch; and to prevent, as it was thought, the 



A Y0UXGER SOX. 45 

possibility of my sleeping, the Scotchman one day, during 
a heavy sea with little wind, ordered me, in his anger, to 
go to the extreme end of the top-sail yard-arm, and 
remain there for four hours. I murmured, hut, obliged 
to comply, up I went ; and walking along the yard on the 
dizzy height, got hold of the top-sail lift, laid myself 
down between the yard and studding-sail-boom, and pre- 
tended to sleep as usual. The lieutenant frequently 
hailed me, bidding me to keep awake, or I should fall 
overboard. This repeated caution suggested to me the 
means of putting an end to this sort of annoyance, by 
antedating his fears, and falling overboard; — not, how- 
ever, with the idea of drowning, as few in the ship could 
swim so well as myself. I had seen a man jump from 
the lower yard in sport, and had determined to try the 
experiment. Besides, the roll of the ship was in my 
favour; so, watching my opportunity, when the officers 
and crew were at their quarters at sunset, I took advantage 
of a heavy roll of the ship, and dropped on the crest of a 
monstrous wave. I sunk deep into its bosom, and the 
agony of suppressed respiration, after the fall, was horrible. 
Had I not taken the precaution to maintain my poise, by 
keeping my hands over my head, preserving an erect 
posture in my descent, and moving my limbs in the air, I 
should inevitably have lost my life. As it was, I was 
insensible to every thing but a swelling sensation in my 
chest, to bursting; and the frightful conviction of going 
downwards with the rapidity of a thunderbolt, notwith- 
standing my convulsive struggles to rise, was torture such 
as it is vain to describe. A deathlike torpidness came 
over me ; then I heard a din of voices, and a noise on the 
sea, and within it, like a hurricane ; my head and breast 
seemed to be splitting. After which I thought I saw a 
confused crowd of faces bent over me; and I felt a loath- 
some sickness. A cold shivering shock my limbs, and I 
gnashed my teeth, imagining myself still struggling as in 
the last efforts at escape from drowning. This impression 
must have continued for a long time. The first circum- 
stance I can distinctly remember was Aston's voice, saying, 
How are you now?" I tried to speak, but in vain; my 



46 ADVENTURES OF 

lips moved without a word. He told me, I was now safe 
on board. I looked round ; but a sensation of water 
rushing in my mouth, ears, and nostrils, still made me 
think I was amidst the waves. For eight and forty hours 
I suffered inexpressible pain ; a thousand times greater, in 
my restoration to life, than before I lost my recollection. 

But what signifies what I endured ? — I gained my 
point. The Scotch lieutenant was severely reprimanded 
for his unjustifiable conduct in sending me to so dangerous 
a place for punishment. The captain's heart was moved 
to order a fowl to be killed for soup ; and he sent me a 
bottle of wine. I had the one grilled, and the other 
mulled, holding an antipathy to every thing insipid. I 
was never sent to the mast-head again ; nor could any one 
suspect even me of such a mad freak as to run a hazard of 
drowning, to rid myself of a trifling annoyance, which 
others bore unrepiningly. 

In taxing the Scotch lieutenant with pusillanimity, in 
the adventure of the Malay craft off the pirate coast, it is 
necessary to explain that an officer, ordered on such an 
adventure, must be vested with discretionary power, im- 
plied by the nature of the service, though not expressly 
set down. The recal-signal was made under the impres- 
sion that the Malay vessel would get on shore ; and that, 
by the support of the natives, for such is their character, 
she might make a desperate resistance. Commanding 
officers are very properly instructed to be economical in 
expending the material of the ship, — that is, the men, — 
in Quixotic adventures ; not from womanish feelings of 
humanity, but on more solid grounds, — the sterling value, 
in pounds, shillings, and pence, of every able seaman, 
taken to a foreign country and inured to its climate, 
besides the difficulty of replacing him. Thus the captain, 
seeing a probability of losing some of his crew, for the 
trifling object of destroying a few savages, and no prospect 
of prize-money, hoisted the recal-signal ; by doing which, 
he washed his hands of the consequences, if they were 
unsuccessful, leaving the officer commanding the boats to 
act on his own responsibility. This, of course, is an 
understood thing. If the ship, making such a signal. 



A YOUNGER SON. 47 

happens to be rather distant, and the boats are in the 
vicinity of their object, they can better calculate on the 
attempt ; then if the probability of success, backed by the 
sailor's ardent love of fighting, and hopes of promotion, 
outweighs the risk, they keep their backs to the signal, 
and push on to the fight. But, on the other hand, if no 
recal-signal is made, however hazardous the service, they 
must attempt its accomplishment. Therefore the general 
impression throughout the ship was against our Scotch 
lieutenant. 



CHAPTER XIII. 

I, alas! 
Have lived but on this earth a few sad years, 
And so my lot was order'd, that a father 
First turn'd the^moments of awakening life 
To drops, each poisoning youth's sweet hope. Shelley. 

Bfsides Aston, there were several of my messmates I 
particularly liked. One of them, about my own age, 
whose name was Walter, was my ordinary associate ; not 
that there was much resemblance in our tastes and cha- 
racters, but his father had treated him with even a worse 
brutality than I had endured from mine. Perhaps indeed 
he had, in conscientious minds, merited his father's hatred, 
from having made his appearance on the stage of life in an 
unlawful and unorthodox manner. Relations and guardians 
had not been duly consulted ; the church had been in- 
vaded in its rights, insulted in its discipline, its ministers 
defrauded of their fees ; no merry peal of village bells, 
or circle of feasting friends, had united their harmonious 
voices in giving the unbidden stranger a welcome into the 
world. Instead of these joyful omens, he and his mother 
were smuggled into the obscure environs of a great city ; 
and as much artifice and precaution used, and as many 
bribes given, to conceal his birth, as if a murder had been 
committed. This was the only mark of his father's care, 



4S ADVENTURES OP 

— at least he had never heard of any other. His mother was 
one of the million of simple girls, who, seduced under a 
promise of marriage, believe in the protestations and oaths 
of lords ; — as if a lord could love any thing so dearly as his 
own coronet ! or that he would hesitate to sacrifice a world of 
ignoble inferiors, rather than be guilty, like base plebeians, 
of keeping his vows, and acknowledging his offspring, with 
a blot on his escutcheon ! 

Walter was educated at a charity school, the Blue- coat 
School, a royal foundation for the maintenance and educa- 
tion of poor and fatherless children ; and who so poor and 
fatherless as this son of a man whose rental was forty 
thousand pounds ? This institution, and many others, 
are admirable nurseries for the bastards of aristocrats ; and 
the commonalty must be proud of its high and distin- 
guished privilege in expending hard-earned wealth for the 
support and instruction of the offsets of our high-mettled 
lords and masters. It would be sacrilege if one drop of 
their noble blood should be spilt on the ground. 

His mother exerted herself to the utmost, and, by some 
means, placed him in the navy. Poor and unprotected, 
save by her, he led but a sorry life, and underwent a series 
of vexatious persecutions, which seemed perpetuated under 
the Scotch lieutenant. These made him gloomy; he 
shunned our mirth and sports ; and, while we were 
carousing, he generally was reading. I felt much for 
him ; and several times took on myself the punishment 
for his neglect of duty. This won his heart. 

To turn the recreant Scotchman into ridicule, I made a 
caricature, representing his obedience to the recal-signal, 
while the two other boats were hastening to the Malay. 
Walter had a better talent for drawing, and I persuaded 
him to execute an improved copy of it ; then watching 
my opportunity, when all the officers were assembled at 
mess, I dropped it down the hatchway on the table. There 
was a burst of laughter, and it was some time before the 
person, who figured as the principal character, discovered 
it ; but when he did, his long colourless face turned to 
a bright lemon-hue, and, festering with suppressed bile, 
he had an attack of jaundice. He spared no pains in 



A YOUNGER SON. 49 

finding out the author of this satire. I should have 
added, that we had annexed, by way of explanation, a 
doggrel poem, which, perhaps from the vanity of author- 
ship, or from the example of ancient bards and a modern 
poet, I was particularly fond of singing, with little atten- 
tion to time and place ; so that very soon it became as 
common with the sailors, as " Cease, rude Boreas," i( Tom 
Bowling," &c, and, to my critical taste, it was much 
superior. I was not then aware that the celebrated author 
of the latter of these national songs had obtained a 
pension, or I certainly should have put in my claim. All 
I got was abuse for the noise I made, together with in- 
creased persecution from the hero I was so indefatigable 
in immortalizing. His ingratitude, like Brutus's dagger, 
was the unkindest cut of all. 

Some time afterwards he discovered that the drawing 
was by Walter. " I thought that fellow (meaning me) 
had done it," said he, " and he is a cheald of the deil, 
capable of any atrocity ; besides, he cares for no one, and 
is protected in his insolence by Aston and the first lieute- 
nant. But as for that pale-faced, sickly boy, Walter, 
whom every body kicks about, by God, I'll make him 
drown himself before he is a week older !" 

Well, he strove to keep his word. By cunning, lying, 
and treachery, he persecuted the captain and first lieutenant 
with such unceasing complaints against him, that poor 
Walter was punished and abused till he became desperate 
from oppression ; and then, replying in hasty words and 
anger, he was degraded from the situation of an officer, 
turned before the mast, and stationed in the mizen-top. 
In spite of orders to the contrary, I was always talking 
to him, and cheering him. His gentle heart was bruised, 
he sunk into gloom, and I feared would have verified the 
lieutenant's prediction. He paid little attention to what 
I said, till I confided to him my determination of leaving 
the ship and navy the first port we entered, counselled him 
to do the same, and pointed out the exquisite treat we 
should have in buffeting his* enemy to death. The hope 
of this wild justice did what no other hope could do — it 
E 



50 ADVENTURES OP 

made him calm. He even feigned to do his duty with 
alacrity. 

His persecutor harassed him with unrelenting brutality. 
He was compelled to do duty with the mizen-top boys ; 
his former messmates were interdicted from speaking to 
him; he was obliged to put on the dress of the sailors, 
and mess with them ; and the Scotchman had exerted his 
utmost influence to blast his name by the abhorrent in- 
fliction of corporeal punishment ; but the captain, though 
hitherto cajoled, would not consent. 



CHAPTER XIV. 

Young hearts which languished for some sunny isle, 

Where summer years and summer women smile j 

Men without country, who, too long estranged, 

Had foundmo native home, or found it changed, 

And, half-uncivilised, preferr'd thecave 

Of some soft savage to the uncertain wave. Byron. 

When on duty, particularly in the night watches, I used 
to accompany him into the top, where I allayed his piteous 
moanings at his fate by prospects of ample vengeance. I 
pointed out to him the facility with which the thing was 
to be achieved ; I told him we were now men ; that we 
had the power of shaking off the fetters which bound us ; 
that our ship was not the world, nor were we galley-slaves 
chained to the oar for life ; that if the English conspired 
against our liberty, they were little more than tyrants of 
the sea-shore, and India, with her thousand kings, was 
open to us ; that there was hope in our very despair of 
the present ; that lower in the scale of misery we could 
not sink, and that any change must, to us, be good. 

" Yes ! let us go," said he, " where no Europeans have 
yet been, and where they dare not follow ! Let us cast 
off a country where we have no patrimony, no parents, 
no ties. Let us change our country and caste, and find a 
home amidst the children of Nature. I have read of such 



A YOUNGER SON. 51 

things ; I have heard they are true. And who so fit to 
make the trial as oppressed outcasts like ourselves ? The 
leprous and despised pariah, loathed by all, to my mind, 
lives in bliss, compared to what I have endured and still 
endure/ * 

u As for leprosy/' answered I, et it's out of the question, 
as I intend that my limbs shall do me good service. They 
are the only friends I have, and the true philosophers in 
the East set a juster value on the gifts of nature than the 
English ; among whom unfinished abortions, with resem- 
blance of form and intellect enough to class themselves 
with human beings, are raised by lying, pimping, and 
hypocrisy, to such a height, that we, who could crush 
them like fleas between a thumb and finger, are compelled 
to stand bare-headed before them ! Now, with the 
natives here, there is no such infamous degradation. 
Strength is power ; and the scales of justice are biassed 
by the sword." 

Walter would kindle up his spell-bound spirit, burst forth 
in ardent and passionate words, transporting himself, in 
imagination, to one of the countless isles of the Indian 
archipelago, and exult in his bow and arrow, his fishing- 
rod, and canoe. " No, no canoe ! " he then exclaimed ; " for 
never will I look on salt-water — my blood would curdle 
at it. No, I will find out some sheltered ravine, some 
river's bank, shadowed by trees ; and there will I live in 
brotherhood with the natives." 

" By taking their sisters," I observed. 
He went on : e ' 1 11 marry, and have children, and build 
a hut." 

t€ And be tattooed and naked ? " I asked. 
" Yes," said he ; " no matter ; what they do, that 
wiU I." 

Thus we would wile away the time, building castles in 
the air, almost possessing them, and forgetting all things 
else, until our pastoral, innocent, romantic fabric was 
suddenly annihilated by the accursed, croaking, querulous, 
sycophantic, broad, vulgar accents of the Scotch lieutenant, 
bawling out, " Haud your tongues, ye wearisome rascals 
in the mizen-top there ; or I wull ha' ye all down to 
e 2 



52 ADVENTURES OF 

the rope's end of the boatswain's mate, — I wull, ye raga- 
muffins '!" 

We then, such is the force of habit, slunk down the 
rigging, crept into our hammocks, and awoke to a repetition 
of our abject slavery during the day, and a continuation 
of our romance at night ; till, I believe, we both looked 
forward to the night-watches with equal anxiety. As to 
Aston, he never ceased to treat Walter otherwise than as 
a gentleman ; and the men, observing his conduct, with 
the ready cunning of slaves, followed his example. 

I have narrated events on board this frigate, as they 
chanced to recur to my memory, not as they happened in 
order of time. After staying a short time at Bombay, 
we sailed to Madras, and then returned to the former 
place with secret instructions from the admiral. 

On our passage from Bombay to Madras, on a fine day, 
as I was sleeping in one of the quarter-boats, there was 
a wild halloo throughout the ship. The first burst of 
Bligh's mutiny came across my mind. Such a commotion 
1 never witnessed on board a man-of-war : the men came 
rushing over each other on deck, up every hatchway; 
discipline was at an end ; the lieutenant commanding the 
deck stood astounded and aghast ; the captain and most of 
the officers were struggling through the dense mass of 
sailors, questioning and commanding ; but all controul 
w T as lost, and they were huddled and wedged together 
without distinction. I soon observed it was despair, and 
not ferocity, that was painted on the rough and weather- 
beaten brows of the men. At last the secret burst forth 
in every voice at once, of " Fire ! fire ! Fire in the fore- 



magazme 



That awful sound effected what nothing else mortal 
could have done ; it made the stout, the hardy, the valiant 
sailor break through the well-organised . drilling of an 
entire life ; and he was seized with an irresistible dread of 
the only element he could shrink from contending with 
—fire, and in the powder magazine! An instant, and 
bodies would be mangled and mingled in the air, without 
distinction of rank or station. Habit or instinct roused the 
officers, who, at the first cry, seemed to participate in the one 



A YOUNGER SOX. 53 

unanimous feeling. None moved but with a flushed brow ; 
and their eyes were glaringly bent on the fore-hatchway, 
awaiting a fate they could not avoid. We were out of 
sight of land ; not a sail in view, nor a speck on the hori- 
zon; the only cloud was the black, dense smoke, which 
burst from the hatchway ; and there being no wind, it 
ascended in an unbroken mass aloft, we anticipating soon 
to follow it. 

A dead silence reigned throughout the gallant frigate ; 
then a confused murmur ; and presently the men, without 
combination, yet simultaneously, rushed aft to the quarter- 
boats ; others crowded to the sides of the ship, straining 
their eyes in the vain hope of espying some means of es- 
cape ; some tremblingly crept up the rigging ; while a 
small band of iron-nerved veterans alone stood undauntedly 
— men grown grizzled from storms, battles, and hardships 
not from years. During this movement I started at the 
loud, clear, trumpet-like voice of Aston, commanding the 
firemen to get their buckets, the marines to come aft with 
their arms, and the officers to follow his example. With 
that he drew a cutlass from the stand ; and now the first 
lieutenant and other officers, as if awakened to their duty, 
drove the men from the boats, and out of the chains. 

The moment I heard Aston's voice I went up to him, 
and said, (i I will go down to the magazine, if you will 
send the gunners there and hand down water.'" 

I rushed forward down the main-hatchway, hurried 
along the abandoned lower deck, seized a rope, and de- 
scended through the smoke directly into the magazine. 
In the forepart, which was darker than the blackest night, 
it was impossible to distinguish whence the fire came. 
I groped about, and found my hands and head burning, 
and a difficulty of respiration from the smoke. Then 
I stumbled over a man, either dead or dead drunk, I 
knew not which ; and tore down bundles of matches, 
which were on fire. In doing this, the blue-lights, used 
for signals, were ignited; upon which I heard some men, 
who were coming down to assist me, cry out, " She is 
going ! " and they hurried back to the deck, where there 
e 3 



54 ADVENTURES OF 

arose another hopeless cry of "She is going!" and then 
all was hushed. 

One glance, as the blue-lights flamed, cleared up the 
mystery. The gunner's mate lay prostrate at my feet, 
with a broken pipe stuck in his mouth, and the only sign 
he gave of life was puffing. The ready-primed matches 
for the guns had caught fire from his carelessness. The 
slow smouldering fire from hundreds of these had alone 
caused the smoke, and the danger was in their proximity 
to the powder. I grasped hold of the blue-lights, fire- 
proof in my ardour, which the probability of saving the 
ship gave me. 

While endeavouring to hand them up, I called out for 
more men. At this instant Aston was jumping down. 
ff Don't come down," I said; f<r but hand these damned 
things up, and then — a dozen buckets of water — and all 
is right." Aston called to one of the men who followed 
him, bidding him go on deck, tell the captain there was 
no danger, and that all we wanted was water. 

The first bucket which was handed down Aston threw 
over me, saying, " You are on fire ! " My hair and shirt 
were burning. This and the smoke, I suppose, were the 
cause of my falling down insensible. Aston took my place. 
The fresh air soon restored me. In a few seconds the ma- 
gazine was inundated by the buckets, and all was safe. 

I was sent for on deck, and went there, my features 
begrimed with wet powder — nothing on but my trowsers 
— my hair and eyebrows burnt, my hands and face 
scorched, and my whole appearance, I imagine, exhibiting 
a lively picture of a fire -demon fresh from hell. All the 
officers smiled ; but they seemed, at the same time, to 
highly laud my presence of mind ; I say seemed , for it is 
against the general custom of the navy to express more. 
Thanking me would have been reprimanding themselves. 
However, I was content ; the impression could not be 
erased ; they could not call me a useless idler, though I 
took care to be a complete idler for a long time after, on 
the plea of my burning and bruising, and they said, 
u Well ! poor fellow, he deserves a little indulgence ! " 



A YOUNGER SON. 55 



. CHAPTER XV. 

Placed in the Arab's clime, he would have been 

As bold a rover as the sands have seen ; 

And braved their thirst with as enduring lip 

As Ishmael wafted on his desert ship : 

Placed upon Chili's shore, a proud casique ; 

On Hellas mountains, a rebellious Greek. Byron. 

On the ship's mooring in any harbour, I watched the first 
opportunity of getting on shore ; and till the blue-peter 
was hoisted, and the fore-top-saii loose, there was little 
chance of seeing me on board. The instant we entered, 
for the second time, the harbour of Bombay, I was, as 
usual, under some plea or other, in a shore-boat ; and 
presently had established my favourite head-quarters in 
the town — to wit, in a tavern, where I plunged headlong 
into extravagant pleasures. What time I could spare 
from women and wine I devoted to galloping about the 
country, rioting in the bazaars, and playing at the billiard- 
table. As in the ship, so it was on shore, every commo- 
tion and disturbance was generally traced to me. In 
India, Europeans lord it over the conquered natives with a 
high hand. Every outrage may be committed almost with 
impunity, and their ready flexibility of temperament has 
acquired a servile subordination. Resistance, or even 
complaint, they scarcely urge ; and the greatest kindness 
from Europeans, for long and faithful services, never ex- 
ceeds what is shown to dogs : they are patted when their 
masters are in good humour, and beaten when they are 
vexed — at least it was so when I was there. As long as 
you refrained from political interference, and presumed not 
to question the omnipotency of the Holy of Holies, the 
East India Company and their servants, as they are 
pleased to designate the governor and all in office, you 
could do no wrong. If you treated the decrees of these 
merchant-sultans with due deference, and expressed your 
servility by arrogance and cruelty to their slaves, the only 
consideration was, that the heat of the climate made it a 
e 4 



56 



ADVENTURES OP 



porter's task, and you were considered by the old stagers 
as a greenhorn, horsewhipping the wretehes during the 
sultry hours of the day. 

I kept up a communication with Walter by notes and 
messages, and had arranged that he should not desert the 
ship till she was on the point of sailing. I was then to 
engage a canoe to lie near the ship at night, and he was 
to drop himself over the bow-port, and swim to her. As 
for the lieutenant, I was to deal with him ; for I had now 
grown tall and strong, and there were few men with whom 
I wouM have hesitated to cope. 

At the tavern where I took up my abode, I commenced 
an intimacy with a merchant. In youth we form friend- 
ships in days, which, at a more advanced age, require 
years. So with this man ; from a game or two at bil- 
liards, eating together, and walking together, we had be- 
come boon companions. Many of the naval officers used 
to come in parties to the tavern to see me, when we often 
sallied about the town, and played a thousand mad pranks. 
My friend the stranger, as he was called, seemed to seek 
the society of naval officers, and take great interest in the 
different accounts of their cruises, the ships they belonged 
to, their rate of sailing, and the peculiarities which dis- 
tinguished their respective commanders. His conversation 
was principally confined to questions ; and as people, for 
the most part, prefer talking to listening, he was liked the 
better. He frequently, in company with me, visited the 
men-of-war in the harbour : the only one I objected to 
introduce him to was my own frigate; but to make him 
amends. I gave every information he wished regarding 
her. 

Though he then called himself De Witt, I shall speak 
of him at once under his real name, De Ruyter. He 
mentioned to me that he was waiting for a passage to 
Batavia ; he seemed perfectly acquainted with India and 
its seas. He spoke most of the European languages, nor 
had he the slightest foreign accent in his pronunciation of 
the English. In walking about the bazars, commonly at 
night, he sometimes met me, and took me with him. He 
was familiar with all the out-of-the-way corners of the 



A YOUNGER SOX. V( 

most irregular of towns, and entered into many dark 
abodes without ceremony. He conversed, on these oc- 
casions, with the natives in their varied tongues with equal 
ease, whether in the guttural, brute-like grunting of the 
Malay, the more humanized Hindostanee, or the softer 
and harmonious Persian. What struck me most at the 
time was the great deference these people paid him ; 
even the proud, fat, swelling, and pompous Armenian 
merchants, stopped their palanquins, and got out to con- 
verse with him, apparently delighted at their meeting. 
These and other circumstances made me wonder, but 
nothing more ; at seventeen we do not expect every man 
to be a rogue, as we do at thirty. There was a self-pos- 
session and decision about De Ruyter's ordinary acts, with 
a general information, that made me feel what, I suppose, 
I should not have thanked any one for remarking ; as, at 
that age, we are loth to allow any to be our superior. 
Perhaps I might not have felt this so strongly, had he 
not been as much my superior in physical as in mental 
endowments. In stature he was majestic; the length and 
fine proportion of his limbs, and the shortness and round- 
ness of his body, gave to his appearance a lightness and 
elasticity seldom seen but in the natives of the East. It 
was only on close examination you discovered that, under 
the slim form of the date tree, was disguised the solid 
strength of the oak. His face wanted breadth to please 
an artist's eye; but it added to the effect of his high, 
clear, bold, un wrinkled forehead — as smooth, though not as 
white, as sculptured marble. His hair was dark and 
abundant, his features well defined. The greatest pe- 
culiarity was his eye ; it was ever so varying that it was 
impossible to distinguish its colour ; like the hue of the 
cameleon, it had no fixed tint, but showed, as in a mirror, 
the reflection of his mind. In a state of rest it was over- 
cast with a hazy film, like a grey cloud ; but when he was 
excited by the vehemence of his feelings, the mist evapo- 
rated, and it gradually brightened till its rays, like the 
sun, became so intense that your own were dazzled be- 
holding it. His eyelashes were jet-black ; he had thick, 
straight, and prominent eyebrows, with a habit of knitting 



58 1DVENTURES OF 

them together, contracted from exposure to the intense 
heat of an eastern sun, leaving an infinity of minuter lines, 
traced at the corners of the eyes, but unlike the deep fur- 
rows of age or debauchery in northern climates. The 
lines of his mouth were boldly and clearly cut ; it was 
muscular, full of expression; and the upper lip, which was 
prominent, had a convulsive action when he spoke, inde- 
pendent of its companion ; his jaw was full, and gave him 
the air of invincible determination. Though naturally 
not of so dark a complexion as myself, those parts of his 
person exposed were not merely sunburnt, but appeared 
to be seared to the very bone. He was approaching his 
thirtieth year. 

I am thus minute in describing De Ruyter, to account 
in part for the extraordinary influence he gained, on so 
short an acquaintance, over my mind and imagination. 
He became my model. The height of my ambition was 
to imitate him, even in his defects. My emulation was 
awakened. For the first time I was impressed with the 
superiority of a human being. To keep on an equality 
with him was unattainable. In every trifling action he 
evinced a manner so off-hand, free, and noble, that it 
looked as if it sprung new and fresh from his own in- 
dividuality ; and every thing else shrunk into an apish 
imitation. 

The enervating influence of a long residence in a tro- 
pical climate had not affected him ; his strength and 
energies seemed insurmountable ; the maddening fever of 
the jungles tainted not his blood ; the sun-stroke fell in- 
nocuous on his bare head ; and he alone went the round 
of his ordinary occupations, regardless of time or tempe- 
rature. But then I observed he drank little, slept little, 
and ate sparingly. While we were carousing, and keep- 
ing midnight orgies, he often joined us, drank his coffee, 
and smoked his hooka. He exceeded the youngest of us 
in the enjoyment of the present hour ; even with the 
sedative aid of the mocha berry, he could scarcely reduce 
his high spirits to a level with ours, when fired by the 
juice of the grape, or maddened by arrack-punch. With- 
out effort he caught the tone of mind among his associates; 



A YOUNGER SON. $9 

thus marking the tolerations of his own, as he had the 
power of bending the most stubborn and thoughtless to 
his will, of directing them, and of moulding them into any 
form which pleased his fancy. But he chose rather to 
draw out ethers' characters, to view them in their natural 
hues, and to relieve the tension of his own high-wrought 
imagination by resuming the thoughts and feelings of boy- 
hood. By putting himself on a par with us, he gained 
that influence which Solomon, in all his wisdom and wise 
sayings, could not have accomplished. 



CHAPTER XVI. 

Do ye forget the blow, the buffets vile? 

Are ye not smitten by a youngling arm ? Keats, 

Treated as an equal by a being of such superior intelli- 
gence and years, I felt a pride, an importance, I had never 
before known. By this conduct he gained my unlimited 
confidence, and imperceptibly drew from me my most 
secret thoughts. I told him I was resolute to leave a 
profession, in which I failed to realise those ardent and 
ambitious prospects of glory it had portrayed in my imagi- 
nation. Instead of encouraging me in this, he ever urged 
me to do nothing prematurely, or in passion. I spoke of 
the neglect and contumely I had suffered ; of the despond- 
ency of my views in life, in consequence of my hopeless 
situation with my family ; and concluded with a firm 
determination to shake off the fetters which galled my 
spirit, and bound down my aspirations ; declaring that, if 
I could do nothing better, I would go into the jungles, 
and herd with wild buffaloes and tigers, where I should at 
least be a free agent, however short my life, rather than 
longer submit to the iron despotism which held my 
very thoughts in bondage. C( Is it not written," I ex- 
claimed vehemently, " in the code of our naval law, that 



60 ADVENTURES OF 

you shall not, in look or gesture, signify that you are dis- 
satisfied with those who govern you by holding the lash of 
correction over your head ? If gods were to rule us by 
brutal intimidation, who would not rebel? And if we 
must have a master, why not enter the service of demons 
and devils, on fair terms and with fair words ?" 

""Nay/' said De Ruyter, "you are running yourself 
aground now. Restrain your passion ; view things in 
their real colours, not as disfigured by the sickly yellow of 
your jaundiced conceptions. We cannot all be masters ; 
nor can the best commander content every one beneath 
him. Your mind has received a warp from the neglect 
and folly of weak, but not evil men. You, who have 
endured so much from the narrow-minded views of others, 
should learn to reason justly and tolerantly ; and dis- 
tinguish between ignorance and malice in those who have 
sinned against you. Now, the only case you have made 
out of malice amounts to little ; and the object is too in- 
significant to waste a thought upon ! — I mean the Scotch 
lieutenant you told me about." 

cc Little ! " replied I ; " do you call that little ? — the 
utter ruin and degradation he has heaped on my friend 
Walter ? And as I am the cause, so am I bound amply 
to revenge his injuries. May every evil in life be concen- 
trated exclusively on my head — - may the pariah scoff and 
spit at me, and the wild dogs hunt me through the 

jungles, if I forgive that malignant " 

As his hated name was trembling on my lips, the 
scoundrel himself, and alone, entered the billiard-room 
where we were talking. He looked at my flushed and 
heated brow, and hesitated what he should do — slink back, 
or advance. He chose to advance, assuming his most ca- 
joling look, with smirks and smiles, and that little enginery 
by which he had wormed his way through the world, 
wrecking the hopes of true and honest men. I should 
mention that he had often visited this tavern whilst I was 
there ; and that on shore he was affable as he was over- 
bearing on board. As I was under his command, perhaps 
he considered me still in his power ; so stepping towards 
me, he said, " Well ! when are you going on board ? 



A YOUNGER SON. 6l 

The ship is ordered to sail to-morrow, and all the officers 
are to be on board by daylight." 

" Is it so ? " said I, in a slow and suppressed voice, to 
hide the fierceness of my purpose, while every fibre of 
my frame swelled in action, and my blood seemed ignited, 
and then congealed to ice ; ie then the time is come to 
settle my accounts ; and most providentially my principal 
creditor is here." 

" What do you mean ? " he asked. 

" Once," I answered, u you told me never to stand in 
your presence with my hat on. I now, for the last time, 
obey you ! " and, with the word, I dashed my hat in his 
face. 

As he stood gazing in amaze, I stripped off the only 
remaining badge of servitude upon me, and, trampling on 
it, exclaimed, il Now, Mr. Lieutenant, I am free ! You 
are no longer my superior officer ! If I must acknow- 
ledge you my superior as a man, prove it with your 
sword ! " Then placing myself between him and the door, 
I added, ci Draw ! This gentleman and the billiard 
marker shall see fair play." 

He attempted to pass, muttering, " What do you mean? 
— are you in your senses ? " Seizing him by the collar, 
I swung him into the middle of the room, and said, 
" There is no escape I Defend your life ! " 

He then went towards De Ruyter, and appealed to him 
for protection, swearing he was ignorant of what I meant, 
or what I wanted. De Ruyter continued calmly smoking, 
and answered, cc Why it seems pretty clear what he 
wants. I have nothing to do with your quarrel. You 
had better draw and fight it out ; he is but a boy, and you 
should be a man by your beard." 

The lieutenant, whose fears then took entire possession 
of his mind, humbled himself to me ; he protested he had 
never intended me any wrong ; that if I thought so, he 
was sorry, and asked my pardon ; he entreated I would 
put up my sword, and go on board with him, promising, 
with an oath, that he would never take advantage of what 
had passed. Disgusted at his meanness, I struck him 
from me, and, spitting at him, vociferated, <( Remember 



62 ADVENTURES 

Walter ! cowardly, malignant ruffian ! What ! you white- 
livered scoundrel ! can no words move you ? — then blows 
shall ! " And I struck him with the hilt of my sword in 
his mouth, and kicked him, and trampled on him. I tore 
his coat off, I rent it to fragments, saying, " This is the 
first time such a poltroon has disgraced this true colour ! " 
His screams and protestations, while they increased my 
contempt, added fuel to my anger, for I was furious that 
such a pitiful wretch should have lorded it over me so 
long. I roared out, e< For the wrongs you have done me, 
I am satisfied. Yet nothing but your currish blood can 
atone for your atrocities to Walter ! " 

Having broken my own sword at the onset, I drew his 
from beneath his prostrate carcass, and should inevitably 
have despatched him on the spot, had not a stronger hand 
griped hold of my arm. It was De Ruyter's ; and he 
said in a low, quiet voice, ie Come, no killing. Here ! " 
(giving me a broken billiard cue,) " a stick is a fitter 
weapon to chastise a coward with. Don't rust good 
steel." 

It was useless to gainsay him, for he had taken the 
sword out of my hand. I therefore belaboured the ras- 
cal : his yells were dreadful ; he was wild with terror, and 
looked like a maniac. I never ceased till I had broken 
the butt-end of the cue over him, and till he was 
motionless. 

De Ruyter, though I was not aware of it at the time, 
had stood sentinel at the door to bar intrusion. He now 
left it, and a shoal of blacks and whites rushed in. 



A YOUNGER SON. 63 



CHAPTER XVII. 

Bring forth the horse! — the horse was brought. 

In truth he was a noDle steed, 

A Tartar of the Ukrain breed, 
Who look'd as though the speed of thought 
Were in his limbs. 

* * * * 

And snorting with erected mane, 
And struggling fiercely, but in vain, 
In the full foam of wrath and dread, 
To me the desert-born was led. Byron. 

At the head of these intruders, to my astonishment, ap- 
peared Walter. His wonder was as great at the scene 
before him, — the man he most loathed lying, as dead, at 
his feet. He gazed on him with a sort of triumph ; his 
lips quivered, and his face became at first scarlet, and then 
pallid. He raised liis eyes to mine, and, seeing me pant- 
ing and speechless with rage, together with the broken 
sword on the floor, the truth flashed on his mind. His 
inquiring gaze then caught De Ruyter, who not only un- 
derstood him, but seemed to know who he was, for he 
asked him if his name was not Walter. Upon being 
informed it was, — ec Well, then," said he, ee there lies 
your enemy, whose breath, I think, your friend has 
stopped. 1 wish he would keep some measure in his 
passion." 

" I hope," replied Walter, " he has not killed him." 
De Ruyter, being in doubt, got up and felt the lieu- 
tenant's pulse. He then .said, a No ; be is not quite dead. 
Here ! — take him out." 

The servants lifted him up ; he opened his eyes; the blood 
was running out of his mouth ; and some of his teeth were 
jammed in. He was a most pitiable object, and blubbered 
like a boy. As soon as he regained his senses, he saw Walter, 
which increased his panic ; and Walter, with a flushed 
brow, restrained himself with difficulty ; for, on hearing 
from De Ruyter that I had not broken the sword in his 
body, but on it, he imagined he was more frightened than 
hurt. But De Ruyter assured him to the contrary, and 



64 



ADVENTURES OF 



observed, " Why, he is as difficult to be killed as the 
tiger-cat. I have never seen a fellow endure such a 
mauling in my life. Come, youngters, he has had enough ; 
and too much, if you are got hold of to answer for it. 
Your way of discharging yourself from the service may 
not be considered as an unexceptionable precedent ; and, 
therefore, before the alarm is given, and the town-gate 
closed, by the affair being made known, had you not 
better cut and run ? As to you, Walter, — have you fol- 
lowed your friend's example in doffing the blue ? What 
means this red sign ? Have you shifted your colours in 
good earnest, or is it a mere frolic ? " 

I had observed, with surprise, that Walter was in a 
military uniform. "Thank God, and my mother!" he 
exclaimed, (i I have a commission in the company's ser- 
vice, and was discharged this morning from the ship. So 
eager was I to pay that fellow the debt I owe him (fortu- 
nately one of the officers going to England has made over 
his traps to me), that, as the frigate sails to-morrow, I 
came here to surprise you, and consult how we were to 
get hold of the infernal villain. I heard you in wrath as 
I entered the house, little imagining you had forestalled 
me in my revenge ; but good fortune never comes single- 
handed." 

De Ruyter interrupted him with — cc Come, be off, like 
the wind ! You'll have time to discuss these matters on 
a fitter occasion. Time presses on. Go," (he con- 
tinued, sinking his voice into a whisper), — " go to the 
bungalo I told you of the other day, near the village of 
Punee. You know the road. Walter or I will be with 
you as soon as the frigate has sailed, and this affair has 
blown over. Now, no more words. Off! I say. 

My horse was brought. He was a vicious-looking 
brute, with an ambiguity in his eye that gave him an un- 
common sinister expression. He had been brought in 
from the country, and having succeeded in throwing se- 
veral of the naval officers, no one would mount him ; so 
that, when first offered to me, he was enjoying a sort of 
sinecure. Never having met with any one or any thing 
as obstinate as mystlf. I liked him. I had a fellow-feeling 



A YOUNGEK SON. 65 

for his independent spirit, took him under my especial 
protection, and found the excitement of contention a de- 
light. A restive and violent horse, in the sweltering- 
climate of the tropics, is considered any thing but the 
means of recreation ; but I loved to stem the stream, and 
never followed the footsteps of the prudent, who keep the 
high-beaten track of the world. My horse and I became 
a show-lion to the sober natives ; and an interest was 
created to see which would conquer. Every day I was in 
the habit of galloping about the narrow streets, to the 
imminent peril of men, women, and brats. Countless 
were the complaints made of stalls upset, bruises, and 
fractures ; and I believe there was one unanimous wish 
throughout the entire district, notwithstanding its hun- 
dred conflicting castes, joined to a hearty curse, against 
me. If curses could have unhorsed me, and directed the 
brute's hoofs to my head, not one among them, heathen 
or Christian would have stirred an inch to arrest the 
visitation of so just a judgment. Thanks to a Turkish 
bit and saddle, which I had substituted for the mockery 
of English ones, I, drunk or sober, kept my seat, and 
diminished, though I could not subdue, the spirit of the 
horse, till we began to understand each other ; and, when 
wearied of contention in private, jogged on together in 
public, like decent married people. On this animal I 
mounted, in a white jacket of De Ruyter's, speeding to- 
wards the gate, under the excitation of drubbing the lieu- 
tenant, not at all allayed by drinking two bottles of claret 
with Walter. The guard of Sepoys was drawn up, be- 
neath the arch of the town-gate, on some point of duty. 
My antipathy to the hired badge of servitude extended to 
all who wore it. In altitude and strength I thought my- 
self augmented; and to show off my newly acquired 
freedom, in which feeling my michievous horse, as if in- 
stigated by the same impulse, most willingly coincided, I 
dashed through the guard with the rapidity of thought, 
and, with a wild triumphal hurrah, scampered on to the 
plain of sand which lies immediately on the outside of 
the town. 



66 ADVENTURES OF 

Here I gave vent to my joy, and played as many antics 
as a madman broke loose from his chains. I spurred me 
willing horse on to the centre of the sandy waste,, hallooing 
and screaming myself hoarse with rapture. I drew the 
sabre De Ruyter had given me^ and flourished it about, 
regardless of my horse's head and ears. As I lost sight 
of the town gate, I pulled in my foaming steed; then 
looking around, and seeing nothing human, I dismounted, 
when, patting the horse's reeking neck, I exclaimed, 
<c Here we are, thou only honest creature, free at last ! 
The spell of my bondage is broken ! Who shall command 
me now ? I will obey no one : I will have no other 
guide than my instinct ; no one's will shall be mine ; I 
am for my own free impulses ! Who dare attempt to re- 
place the yoke around my neck ? Let them come here ! 
I'll not move from this spot, though pursued by all the 
men in the fleet and garrison V* 



CHAPTER XVIII. 

The sun was sinking — still I lay 
Chain'd to the still and stiffening steed, 

I thought to mingle there our clay ; 
And my dim eyes of death had need — 
No hope arose of being freed. Byron, 

Thus I continued my idle vaunting to the winds ; my 
bosom swelled with the free beatings of my heart; to 
roam at liberty, unchecked by churlish superiors, was 
ecstasy. I had thrown off my cap, though the sky 
looked like molten gold or brass ; and was proceeding 
to tear off my clothes, though the white sand sparkled 
fiercely, and pierced the soles of my feet like fire; so 
abhorrent to me was every vestige or sign of slavery — 
or, which was the same thing at that moment, of civi- 
lisation. During the paroxysm, I should have unsad- 
dled and unbridled my horse, to give him also freedom, 



A YOtNGER SON. 67 

but, at this period, I beheld some commotion at a dis- 
tance. 

My first impression of its being some one in pursuit 
subsided, on discovering that I was between it and the 
tower. I endeavoured to distinguish what it was ; but all 
I could see was a silvery cloud of sand rising in a bright 
circle, and a dark object, at intervals, discernible. I 
mounted, and galloped towards it. As I advanced, I 
saw it was a horse, running incessantly in a round. I 
went on, and, amidst the clouds of sand, I saw that the 
lunging and plunging of the horse were every instant more 
violent. My own threw up his crest, replied to his loud 
neighings, and pressed on ; but, on approaching the object 
my astonishment was raised to the highest pitch at a voice 
hailing me, and at beholding a man, in a cavalry uniform, 
half covered with sand, while the sweat and blood were 
trickling down from his close- cropped poll to his forehead 
and face. I shouted out, " What is the matter ? " when 
the horse came towards me. His large eye and expanded 
nostrils were of deep crimson, and the blood from several 
gashes on his head, neck, and flanks, mingled with the 
white foam on his bright black skin. With erect mane 
and tail, and open mouth, he came to within a few yards 
of me. I pulled up, and drew my sabre. He then 
wheeled round, and, making several circles within each 
other in rapid motion, he flung out his hind legs at the 
prostrate soldier, whose sword defended him with difficulty. 
The horse endeavoured to avoid being cut by alertness 
and rapidity. The saddle and housings, lying by the 
man, in some measure protected him. On being foiled in 
striking with his hind-feet, the horse turned round short 
on his haunches, and, with startling ferocity, plunged in 
head foremost, like a tiger, striking with his fore-feet 
right out, and even trying to get hold of the man with his 
teeth. 

Here was a revolution, — the horse attempting to kill 

his rider, and using his armed hoofs against his head ! 

In compliance with my spirit of freedom, I should have 

aided the horse, or remained neuter ; but instinct im- 

f 2 



68 ADVENTURES OP 

pelled me to side with the biped. Pushing in to the 
rescue, I endeavoured to get between the two, but it was 
no easy matter ; for the horse made no attack on me ; on 
the contrary, he used every effort to avoid my interference. 
I hallooed, and tried to drive him off. He retreated a 
hundred yards, when as, once or twice, I was dismounting 
to succour the apparently exhausted man, he returned to 
the charge. However, from exertion and loss of blood, 
he waxed weak and less wary ; so that, after many abortive 
attempts, I succeeded in ham-stringing him. He now 
gave one loud bellow, and strove, with a staggering gait, 
to gallop off, frequently falling. I followed, and had se- 
veral cuts at him, till, faint from loss of blood, he fell, 
unable to rise. 

I left him there, and went back to the man, who seemed 
in little better condition than the horse. All I could dis- 
tinguish, in answer to my speaking to him, was, " Water ! 

— water ! — water ! " — but I had none, nor was there 
any near us. . The man's mouth was clotted, almost ce- 
mented, with blood and sand ; I wiped it and his nostrils 
with my jacket. Partly by signs, and partly by words, 
he directed me to open the holsters on his saddle. I did 
so, and found old Falstaff's substitute for a pistol, a bottle 

— not, indeed, of sack, but of arrack. I gave him some, 
and rubbed his face and head with the remainder. This 
restored him, when I asked him to get up and ride my 
horse, till we should arrive at some hut. He waved his 
hand, and said, 

ri No ! I have had enough of horses to-day." 

4fc Well, will you walk ? " 

c How can I ? " he replied ; eg my leg and my left arm 
are cracked, or you would not have found me beaten by 
that brute. If you had not come up, he would have 
finished me. I was nearly done. I never heard of such a 
thing before, though I have been a rough rider to the regi- 
ment for sixteen years, and crossed all sorts and breeds of 
cross-grained cattle. Never, till now, could one throw 
me from his back, without rearing, on a clean field. Then 
to come in upon me, like a wild beast, with hoof and 



A YOUNGER SON. 69 

tooth ! — he must be mad. I hope you have killed 
him." 

Dungaree was the nearest village. I mounted, rode 
thither, pressed a palanquin into service, and returned to 
the soldier. He was in great pain, but calmer. He told 
me, the horse belonged to the colonel of the regiment. 
He had been purchased at a great price, of an Arab ; was 
quiet at first, and afterwards became so vicious and violent, 
that none could mount him. " I," he continued, " under- 
took to tame him or kill him. I have done my best. I 
tried in vain to work down his mettle ; he was not to be 
beaten. Deprived of his food, he was only the more 
furious, and watched, with wonderful cunning, every oc- 
casion of kicking and biting me. Once he got hold of 
me by the back, and lifted me into his manger ; and if I 
had not been tolerably strong, and assisted by others, he 
would have killed me. Whenever I rode him, he used 
every artifice to throw me ; which he had never been able 
to achieve till to-day, when, by violent lungings and 
lashings-out, he worked the saddle down to his loins, and, 
in that situation, set off at full speed, and succeeded in 
shaking me off. As I was lying doubled up, he broke my 
arm, and, I believe, my leg. Then, after going a short 
distance, he stopped, and wheeled round to renew the 
blow. I had, with great difficulty, drawn my sword ; 
and till you, sir, came up, which was but a few minutes, 
he was attacking me in the way you found him. Though 
I had wounded him with my sabre in many places, the 
devil only grew more savage. I was frightened more at 
his looks than at any thing else ; and I do verily believe, 
sir, he was the devil/ ' 

" Do you ?" said I, " then it is some consolation, my 
man, to see he is dead." 

With that I sent him into Bombay, directing the men 
to the hospital, giving them money, and promising more, 
provided they made haste. 



70 ADVENTURES OF 



CHAPTER XIX. 

Whether she was a " mother," I know not, 
Or whether they were " maids " who called her mother, 

But this is her seraglio's title, got 

I know not how, but good as any other 

So Cantemir can tell you, or De Tott : 
Her office was to keep aloof or smother 

All bad propensities in fifteen hundred 

Young women, and correct them when they blundered. Byron. 

At sunset I returned to the village, determined to con- 
clude a busy day by a noisy night. This village is set 
apart by the government to provide for the exclusive re- 
sidence of a separate caste. Here was formed a little 
Utopia. 

I put my horse up, and made a round to examine the 
motley group in the different mud-built and bamboo huts. 
The well-greased and black beauties of Madagascar first 
presented themselves. At the next hut there was but 
a small assemblage. A ferret-eyed, amber-hued, thick- 
set Japanese looked out from the door, shining like a sun- 
flower. 

The abode of an ancient friend of mine, who occasion- 
ally sold liquor to her visiters, received me. She was the 
female Schaich of the tribe. Her dwelling was pre- 
eminent, being distinguished by a second story, with ve- 
randahs. This was the chief resort of the Europeans, in 
compliment to whom she had mounted a sort of English 
head-dress above her mahogany visage. She united in her 
person the characteristics of the buffalo of the jungles, — its 
ball-proof hide of dingy hue, decorated with bristly strag- 
gling hair, sunken eye, and horny face, — with the splay feet 
and hump of the dromedary. She was a monstrous hag, 
that looked coeval with Sin. 

The inmates of her house were heard approaching. I 
distinguished the little patterings of their baby feet, and 
presently the jingling of their bangles and rings. Arms, 
wrists, ancles, toes, and fingers, glittered with brass, 
silver, and glass, making most harmonious music, as from 



A YOUNGER SON 71 

aloft they descended a faery. looking bamooo ladder, like 
a continuous stream of ants down an old wall. With 
flowing trowsers, and scanty cotton vest, each female 
was starred on the forehead with yellow or red ochre. 
There was every gradation of colour and caste, muddy, 
olive, leaden, copper ; and all the family of browns, from 
the dusky-red scaly cock-roach of India, till it became lost 
in the shining jet-black beetle of my own country. There 
were all ages, and every degree of stature : from nine to 
(what the old hecate appeared to be) ninety ; and from 
the height of my pipe-stick to that of the palm-tree. 
There was the light and pliant-limbed Kubshee coupled 
with the swollen and blubbered Hottentot, moving like a 
porpoise ; the Hindoo girl, with eyes like the stag, and 
form like the antelope ; the fair, oily, moon-faced, fleshy 
Armenian, fashioned like a turtle ; and the soft and fond- 
ling Parsee, like a turtle-dove. Among these were the 
Cheechees, a race of the mingled blood of Europe and 
India — a compound of fire and frost — with the tallowy 
whiteness of the English joined to the dark hair of the 
east; and, though wanting the roseate tints of their 
western sires, yet were they amply compensated by the 
bright and glowing brilliancy of their mothers' eyes, un- 
alloyed by the dead and fish-like colour of the north. 

On entering the hut I had ordered an ample supply of 
the ingredients for composing what doctors designate by 
the name of liquid fire, but which the unlearned call 
punch. Of this I poured so much down my throat as 
nearly to deprive me of my senses, and I made an effort 
to ascend to the upper part of the hut. 

As I staggered toward the ladder, the old Schaich stood 
before me to prevent my going up, when I sent her reeling 
into the room, snatched up a piece of blazing pine- wood, 
and ascended into a sort of loft.. Half a score of the oc- 
cupants of the house started up to mar my further progress. 
This would have impelled me on, had I been sober ; but, 
with the pertinacity of drunkenness, I was about to do 
more, for I cried out, " Keep off! or I'll see if you 
are true-bred salamanders, or not ! " and was applying the 
fire to the cane-work of the hut. 
f 4 



72 ADVENTURES OF 

My opponents fell back with a discordant croak, and I 
rolled into an inner room, -wrenching away the matting 
which enclosed it, when a rough voice bawled out, " Hold 
fast there, you young dog ! 

" Holla, old Hoofs !" I exclaimed, recognising the 
voice of my late captain, and saluting him with his nick- 
name among us, from the preposterous dimensions of his 
feet ; " Holla ! old clod-hopper ; you here, and getting 
drunk ! " 

cc Get out, sir ! What do you mean by this audacity ? 
Why are you not aboard, sir? Don't you know the 
orders ? " 

Ci Get out ! No, I won't ; and I don't intend going on 
board again. I am discharged, most potent Signor ! " 

" What do you mean, you scoundrel ? " 

" Mean ! why, that before we part, we'll have a glo- 
rious bowl of punch together, in spite of your grave 
looks." 

Seeing I was not to be balked in my humour, he gave 
way to me, and, indeed, not being a very austere cha- 
racter, he entered into the frolic ; besides, though not 
drunk, he was not sober. 

We sat over our punch, while I sung, or rather roared? 
the song of the '* Old Commodore," — 

" The bullets and the gout 
Have so knocked his hull about, 
He '11 no longer be fit for sea.*' 

Then in return for his kindness in playing the parson out 
of soundings, I treated him with a sermon, expatiating on 
his manifold sins and iniquities, especially in getting in- 
toxicated. Yet, notwithstanding the orthodoxy of my 
doctrine, and the courtesy with which maiden speeches 
and sermons are attended to, the old commodore was as 
impatient to be off, as j£ he had been seated on lunar 
caustic. 

He nevertheless plied me with grog, till the last glim- 
merings of my reasoning faculties were flickering in the 
socket. Some Nach girls dancing in the room, and shak- 
ing their bangles, looked like imps; while the volcanic 
fire within my body, together with the oven-like closeness 



A YOUNGER SON. ? 3 

of the room, impressed me with a notion that I was in the 
infernal regions. The captain stole away during the time 
I was dragging down a bamboo rafter, with which I de- 
molished the cudgeree-pots, and all within its swing. 
The hag grew furious at the destruction of her household 
gods and goods, and called out for the Burkandazers (po- 
lice-officers of the village). Thus backed, she made a 
furious attack upon me, exclaiming, Ci You more like 
tiger, not than man. You no go my house. I make 
sepoys come kill you. I never see such obstroperousness 
when I live." 



CHAPTER XX. 



The last of human sounds which rose, 
As I was darted from my foes, 
Was the wild shout of savage laughter, 
Which on the wind came roaring after 
A moment from the rabble rout ; 
With sudden wrath I wrenched my head 
And writhing half my form about, 
Howi'd back my curse. 

***** 
Away ! — away ! — my breath was gone — 
I saw net where he hurried on : 
'Twas scarcely yet the break of day, 
And on he foamed — away ! — away ! Byron. 



The hubbub within soon brought up some sepoys from 
without. On seeing a fellow's pike peering above the 
ladder, my blood began to rise, and my passion to sober me. 
Hecate an/1 her witches were hanging on me like a pack of 
terriers on a badger. I shook off, with a sudden effort, the 
lethargic effect of drink, as well as ftie old and young who 
clung to me, as the tiger does his parasite providers, the 
jackalls, when he himself is hunted. Regaining the bamboo, 
I drove them down the ladder : in their confusion, their 
weight, with the addition of the flabby govemante, broke 
the ladder, when they fell, and formed a cone-like hill below, 



74 ADVENTURES OP 

of which she was the apex; she plumped down like a Dutch 
dogger out of the slips, sepoy and all vanishing beneath her 
ample beam. Great was the uproar which succeeded. A 
dense crowd had collected outside, with a sprinkling of 
peons, sepoys, and police. 

I now thought it time to remove myself. One wick of 
the shattered lamp was still burning; with that I lighted 
some cotton dipped in oil, and fired the house in several 
places. Its dry and combustible materials rapidly bright- 
ened up into a fierce flame. A wild shout from without- 
side proclaimed the event. I had no time to lose. Amidst 
the burning and crackling, I precipitated myself from the 
window, and luckily alighted on the sepoy halberdier. I 
was not hurt, but he was. Springing up, I seized his pike, 
which had fallen from his hand, used it as a quarter-staff, 
and cleared my way, till I gained the shed in which my 
horse was tethered. I clapped the bit in his mouth ; but in 
the darkness and hurry not finding my saddle, I mounted 
without it, and took the field. 

Determined on seeing the fire, I turned round on the 
sepoys and others, who were close at my heels ; and putting 
my spear in the rest, like a knight of old, I dashed full tilt 
down the narrow lane, broke through them, and spitted one 
against a small mud temple, well nigh immolating him as 
an offering to the God Bramah ; while my vicious and sa- 
crilegious horse thrust his impious hoofs into the very pe- 
netralia of the piscina, a little niche, with a pipkin-bellied 
idol, and a cudgeree-pot of perfumed rice, which were-dashed 
to atoms. They yelled curses at us, — iC Yaoar ! Dog !" 
But, under the dark wing of night, we escaped the missiles 
which were hurled after us, and we heeded not words. We 
now sprang into the middle of the crowd gathered before 
the conflagration, and created much havoc. I came upon 
them in great wrath, for I had but a little time to stay. The 
mob fled before me like wild ducks. As old Muckery was 
busying herself, with a long bamboo, in fishing out her 
traps, J applied the sharp end of my pike to her, and goaded 
her into the embers. She grasped a number of flaming 
bamboos, and, missing me, burnt the horse ; upon which he 
rushed forward, kicking and rearing with ungovernable 



A YOUNGER SON. 75 

fury. I could neither stop nor check him. We cleared the 
village. 

Away we went as free and fast as the wind. My head 
became dizzy ; and rushing though the fresh air, after a 
heated room, made me death-like sick. With difficulty I 
clung to my seat, unassisted by saddle. All around me was 
darkness and gloom. I crossed a wide jeel, where my sa- 
gacious Bucephalus plumped into a ford, and waded and 
swam to the opposite bank. With my head laid down on 
his neck, I held on by his long shaggy mane. As I knew 
I was receding from the fort, I cared not whither he bore 
me. Fain would I have pulled up, for I was overcome by 
a drunken drowsiness ; but one of the reins had given way, 
and my mettled courser speeded on, reeling, and floundering, 
and blowing like a grampus, I know not how long, for I 
was hardly sensible. He made towards a glimmering light : 
it belonged to a chokey, and striking there against something, 
the shock was like that of a ship against a rock. He gave 
two or three heavy rolls and fell on me, as I had fallen on 
the sepoy. I became insensible; and long I must have 
continued so. 

On opening my eyes, I gazed around with astonishment, 
and felt as after a trance. A group of people, squatted on 
their haunches, encircled me. A thin and wizard-visaged 
old man, with the peeta of a Bramin, seemed mumbling 
incantations; all I could distinguish was, — " Topee Sahib! 1 * 

— <e Ram, ram, ram ! *' — and u Dum, dum, dum ! " A 
better looking, and better garmented man, with a grizzly 
beard, said nothing but — " IV Allah /" 

I tried to sit up, and signed to give me water ; they 
shook their heads. My mouth was glued, I could not speak, 
and was faint with thirst. I found I was lying on a mat, 
under the shade of a Bunyan's shop, with verandahs. He 
came out on hearing I was alive, and spoke to me in English ; 

— no music was ever so harmonious. He brought me a 
cudgeree-pot of toddy, which revived me ; no drink was 
ever so delicious. Close to me stood a bheestie, gazing and 
gaping with wonder ; a bamboo was poised across his 
shoulder, supporting two buckets of palmetta-leaf, full of 
water. He had been entreated by my gestures to let me 



76 ADVENTURES OP 

have some, but he grinned refusal. I now grasped hold of 
the rim of the bucket, and tilted it over my head. The 
water smoked on my burning temples ; instantly I felt a 
thrilling sensation of pleasure ; and I sat up. 

Then I discovered I was at a village near the road to 
Callian. It was long ere I could recollect the events of the 
past day. My bones ached as if I had been beaten to a 
mummy ; and my face, head, and hands were cut. ' The 
horse was first recalled to my mind by a lock from his long 
mane, which was entwined in my fingers, still clenched. I 
went into the shop, and lying down again, fell into a pro- 
found sleep. I awoke, when the sun was sinking in the west, 
drenched with perspiration. After eating some fruit, I 
went to a tank, bathed, and felt as man new made. 

Ruminating on my situation, and remembering I was to 
meet De Ruyter at the bungalo, I inquired for my horse. 
They knew nothing of him. I had been carried by some 
cooleys from the chokey, and laid in the bazaar. By the 
advice of the shop-keepers, I hired a bufFalo-hackerie and 
proceeded towards the rendezvous. 



CHAPTER XXI. 

There is a pleasure in the pathless woods, 

There is a rapture on the lonely shore, 
There is society where none intrudes 

By the deep sea, and music in its roar : 

I love not man the less, but nature more, 
From these our interviews, in which I steal 

From all I may be, or have been before, 
To mingle with the universe, and feel 
What I can ne'er express, yet cannot well conceal. Byron. 

An author, justly celebrated for his knowledge of human 
nature, observes. <e Let a man be ever so honest, the account 
of his own conduct will,, in spite of himself, be so very 
favourable, that his vices will come purified through his lips; 
for though the facts themselves may appear, yet so different 
will be the motives, circumstances, and consequences, when 



A YOUNGER SON. 77 

a man tells his own story, and when his enemy tells it, that 
we can scarce recognise the facts to be one and the same 
tiling *" 

In twenty hours I arrived at a small village, on the 
frontiers of the Deccan ; and there, having discharged my 
hackerie, I picked up a couple of cooleys, passed through 
some paddy and Indian corn-fields, crossed a ford, and 
reached De Ruyter's bungalo, which I knew by land-marks 
he had given me, and by the compass. It was prettily 
situated on a rising ground at the foot of a mountain, in a 
retired nook, hid in a grove of cocoa-trees, which love a 
light and shingly soil, and sheltered by hills to the north, 
east, and west. There was a wild garden, overgrown 
with guava, mango, and pomegranate trees, and sur- 
rounded by a high and impervious fence of prickly pear. 
The inside of the house was painted in blue and white 
stripes to look like a tent, the roof of the centre room being 
supported by upright bamboos, on which were suspended 
arms, guns, and spears for the chase. Two sleeping 
apartments adjoining to this were divided by split bamboos 
and matting. It was furnished with a tent -table, beds, 
and other conveniences ; a few books and drawing-mate- 
rials ; with rough but spirited sketches of ships, and of 
lion and tiger -hunts, hanging on the wall. A small open 
space before the door, studded with banana and lemon- 
trees, drooping with fruit, sloped down to a large tank, 
used as a bath, encircled with rose, jessamine, and gera- 
nium. An old peasant, in charge of the place, said, " You 
see, master, it is ungregi, — English fashion." On the 
east side of the bungalo, canopied by a magnificent sago- 
palm, was a long, low shed, which served for kitchen ; and 
under the same roof dwelt the peasant, with his wife and 
family, and a yak, or little cow, which was squabbling 
with the children about some fruit. 

This yak was remarkably small and wiry haired. The 
man told me she was good, strong to ride, and that his 
malek (master) had brought her out from the sea. 

" A sea-monster ! " I said with a laugh. ce Come, then, 
we'll have a swim together ! " and was going to turn her 
into the tank. 



78 ADVENTURES OF 

" No, no, she like go up mountain ; no like go down 
water." 

I inquired if he had seen his malek lately. a No/' he 
replied ; " but he had sent, two days back, much things for 
huzoor," another name for master. 

ci Did he not write ? " Upon which he took a scanty 
rag of turban from his pate, and extracted from its folds, 
where it was carefully enveloped, a plaintain leaf, doubled 
up and secured with a piece of coir twine. I cast off the 
leaf, and found a note from De Ruyter. 

" Why the devil," I asked, " did you not give me this 
before?" 

" You not tell me to." 

ce No, for how could I know you had it ? " 

" Yes, malek know every thing ; poor gaowala-man 
know nothing at all." 

This made me comprehend why no eatables had been 
offered to me, while I was ravenous as a wolf in winter, 
notwithstanding I had kept my jaws in perpetual motion 
with all sorts of fruit. I therefore ordered tiffin, and 
returned to the house to read the letter; by which I 
learned that the frigate had sailed, after some little inquiry 
for me at my usual quarters. This was a great relief, and 
my heart leaped with joy. 

De Ruyter concluded his letter by saying he had been 
detained by Walter, who was placed under arrest while 
the affair of the Scotch lieutenant was investigated ; and 
notwithstanding every lie had been invented to implicate 
Walter, De Ruyter's evidence acquitted him. The ship 
was delayed one day, to inquire into the affair, and to 
remove the Scotchman on board; for he was very ill, 
spitting blood, with two of his ribs stove in; so that, 
together with the dislocation of his jaw, and loss of ivory, 
I considered my debt to him handsomely cancelled, and 
sponged the rascal from my memory, I thought for ever. 
Walter had offered him satisfaction, but he was surfeited 
with what he had already received. I afterwards learned 
that he never ventured on shore at Bombay, saying that 
malaria, musquitoes, and scorpions made it worse than 



A YOUNGER SON. 79 

hell ; but what he dreaded more than the cobra-di-capelia 
itself, was the sight of Walter there. 

I sent a cooley to bring me a hooka, bathed in the tank, 
and, with a book, the " Life of Paul Jones," lay under 
the trees, eating my dessert after an abundant Indian 
lunch. A lightness, elasticity, and exuberance of joy, 
never felt before, thrilled through me. It was the first 
day I could number of entire happiness ; nor did I then, 
as in more mature years we do, dash the present hour with 
thinking on the ensuing one. The only happy life ap- 
peared to be a peasant's ; and his limited wants the cause 
of his being happy. Forthwith I essayed it, threw my 
torn and soiled garments from me, twisted a piece of 
striped cotton, as cummerbund, round my waist, and put 
a turban on my head. Thus, barefooted, with a cocoa- 
knife in my hand, and well greased with cocoa-nut oil, I 
sallied into the grove, and, with the peasant's family as- 
cended the trees, learnt how to tap them, and how to 
hang the toddy-pots. This and gardening -made my time 
pass on so smoothly, that, on the third day, when I 
received notice of De Ruyter's being on the road, I felt it 
as an interruption on my quiet and my solitude. 

However I mounted the yak, a bamboo in one hand 
and my knife in the other, and went forth, preceded by 
two coolies, to meet him. Suddenly turning a tope of 
neem trees, he was before me, occupied in narrating a 
history of lion-hunting to Walter ; and so complete was 
my metamorphosis, that he was passing on without recog- 
nition, until his quick eye rested on his own yak. I 
hailed him with, C( Holloa ! De Ruyter, — what cheer, 
ho ! " They pulled up in astonishment ; and, after sur- 
veying me an instant, they set up such a wild roar of 
laughter that I thought them out of their senses. De 
Ruyter rolled off his horse, and held his sides, exclaiming,, 
" By heaven, you'll kill me, you mad-cap ! " 

Looking very serious, I observed, ce I am not aware of 
any thing sufficiently ludicrous to excite your merriment. 
I am rigged in the fashion of the country ; and it is best 
adapted to the climate, — is it not ? If you like to have 



80 ADVENTURES OF 

some fresh toddy, here are these fellows with my cudgeree- 
pots full of the freshest, and of my own tapping/' 

We sat down on the bank, talked, and, when they were 
weary of their mirth, I remounted my yak, preceding 
them to the bungalo. 

We passed two days of unalloyed happiness. W< 
climbed the hills, we chased the jackalls, regardless oi 
heat or toil ; we sang and danced, not as in the days ot 
slavery from the excitement of drink, for we were drunk 
with joy. 

De ftuyter and I were both, from choice, of plain and 
simple habits. He never committed any excesses ; and 
those I was guilty of arose from my volcanic materials, 
which were fired like powder, from any accidental spark, 
though struck by an ass's hoof. In everything I under- 
took, no matter how ridiculous, I must out-herod Herod, 
brooking no compeer. My brow now burns with shame 
in remembering how many follies (to give them the 
mildest term) I then and afterwards committed. Severity 
and constant thwarting had accumulated within me so 
much of the subtle spirit of opposition and obstinacy, 
that it has mingled itself with every action of my life ; 
while my judgment and better feelings have in vain 
struggled to stem the stream that bore me on. False 
lights have distorted the fairest and brightest scenes of my 
existence ; converting that which was really good and 
beautiful to blackness, and leading me to act the characters 
I most despised. Thus I have played the drunkard, the 
glutton, the braggart, and the bully. My wrong view of 
things must have been the effect of education and example ; 
for by nature I was the reverse of all this, and when acting 
on sudden impulses, I have seldom erred. 



A YOUNGEH SON. 81 



CHAPTER XXII. 

The kings of Inde their jewel-sceptres veil, 
And from their treasures scatter pearled hail ; 
Great Bramah from his mystic heaven groans, 
And all his priesthood moans. 

He felt assured 
Of happy times, when all he had endured 
Would seem a feather to the mighty prize. Keats. 

After the second day Walter was compelled to return to 
his regiment. As he was delighted with his new profes- 
sion, so was he determined to be exemplary in the fulfil- 
ment of his duty. Though we had talked day and night 
with little intermission, we could not afford time to say a 
word either of the past, or of our plans for the future. 
We therefore agreed to have a speedy meeting to discuss 
these points. On the morning of his departure he said, 
fC You are now a free agent and an idler. We are en- 
camped on the artillery-ground. Come to my tent. What 
I have, you may command. I wish to heaven you would 
procure a commission in our regiment — you could 
do so." 

" No, no, Walter ; the badge of servitude, blue or red, 
I have shaken off for ever. King nor Company shall bribe 
me with their gold, their honours, or their frippery, to 
give up my birthright of free agency. And for what ? — 
bread ? — I can find its substitute on every bush." 

u Ay," he replied ; u but you love glory, and cannot live 
without broils and fighting." 

" If so, I can find enough of it in the world, and choose 
my own ground and cause ; not fight like a butcher's dog, 
on compulsion, because I am fed on my master's offal, 
and feed with sixpence a day. You, Walter, will be 
slipped like a dog from his collar against these subdued 
and trampled-on slaves. Your masters foment disunion 
and enmity among them, and then despatch their myr- 
midons to seize upon their wealth and country, to make 
them helots, or exterminate them as rebels and traitors. , 



82 ADVENTURES OF 

Is this glory ? Now, if I want fighting, I shall most as- 
suredly change my colours, and battle against tyrants and 
oppressors wherever they are to be found — and where are 
they not ? " 

To this he said, <c Do not let us disturb these few last 
minutes at parting with discussion. Perhaps I think with 
you — perhaps you know that such are my sentiments ; 
but I am not made of the same tough stuff as you are. 
Alas ! my poor mother has known nothing but sorrow and 
disappointment ! Her existence has been cheerless. In 
my helpless years no hand but hers caressed me — I knew 
no resting-place but on her bosom — and when I could 
distinguish one from another, I never left her dear pre- 
sence. When I was ill she lulled me to sleep by singing 
and by her harp, and sealed my eyelids with kisses and 
tears. Once, in the wild spirit of healthy boyhood, I 
asked her — Heaven knows how innocently ! — for my 
father. She laid her head on the table, and the room 
shook with her convulsive sobs." 

Walter turned away his head, struggling in vain to 
speak. At length, with an effort, he continued, " You 
may think me a boy still to talk thus, for you do not know 
the pure and intense love which two hearts united, and 
indifferent to all others, can feel — a friendless mother and 
her orphan child ! How can I, knowing that the dear 
angel has stinted herself, perhaps of the necessaries of life, 
in order to remove me from a situation in which she 
thought I suffered — for I forbore to tell her so directly 
— how can I, now that her exertions and prayers have 
been heard, destroy her fondest hopes ? At least I am re- 
moved to a comparative state of happiness, and after two 
years, I shall be allowed leave of absence to go to England, 
and then . — but tell me, can I — would you — deny such 
a parent any thing ? " 

I had followed his example in turning away my face, 
for I could not reply. So it is in civilised life ! — we are 
ashamed of our feelings when natural, and glory, if not in 
atrocity, in assumed apathy. 

He then added, " Come to me, and that speedily. We 
will talk over your plans; and remember whatever you do, 



A YOUNGER SON. $$ 

or I do, we are always brothers. Here, take this book — 
it has almost unfitted me for my new profession — it is 
written for you, and for men with souls like yours. I 
must try to forget it, but who can estrange his mind from 
truth?" 

He wrung my hand, and was soon out of sight. When I 
looked towards De Ruyter, who had been calmly smoking 
his hooka under a tree, I perceived he was rubbing his eyes 
with his rough and red hand. " That Walter," said he, 
iC will make women of us all. Now, I love my mother 
too — but cannot talk of her. And, like him, I had no 
father — at least I never knew him !" He then, as was 
his custom when moved, bent his head to the ground, and 
smoked with redoubled violence. After a pause, he went 
on with, " That is a good-hearted fellow, but he has sucked 
too much of his mother's milk — it has almost made him 
a girl. What book is that he has given you ?— his mo- 
ther's Bible ? — or a drawling psalter ? — or a cookery 
book ? — or an army list ? " He took it out of my hand. 
" Ha ! " he cried out, " Volney's Ruins of Empires, and 
Laws of Nature ! By the God of Nature, the fellow has 
some soul ! Had I known this sooner, I would have 
worked him to a better purpose ! But, after a moment's 
reflection, he said, " No ! a crooked stick, though straight- 
ened, is ever struggling to resume its natural bend. I 
confide in men like yourself, men naturally upright and 
resolved. They may be warped too by their humours, or 
by force : but, in the end, they will resume their upright- 
ness, or be broken. Come, * * * *, I must return to 
town to-morrow; and in ten days I am going to sea. 
What do you intend to do ? " 

cc Why, I have not yet," I answered, iC given it a 
thought. I like this sort of quiet life." 

At this he smiled, and said, u Well, my dear fellow, 
don't balk your wishes. The bungalo is yours, if you like 
it. Let me see, — there are sixteen cocoa-nut trees, — 
the devil's in it if they and the garden won't keep you and 
your yak in your natural state ; for old Saboo there keeps 
himself, and frow, and half a score of young ones, with 
half their number. Think of their value : from their sap 
g 2 



84 ADVENTURES OF 

you have toddy ; toddy, fermented, becomes arrack ; the 
fruit, with rice, is an excellent curry ; and, compressed, 
you have abundance of oil to brighten your skin, and 
lighten your darkness ; then of every shell you can make 
a cup ; the husks will furnish you with bedding, twine, 
cordage, ropes, and cables ; and the tree itself, when old, 
may be formed into a canoe. Some of these commodities 
you can barter for rice and ghee/' 

u So I will ; besides, I can live on fruit, and hunt, and 
shoot." 

cc Do so, my lad. Only, as the most exquisite luxuries 
do pall, and become nauseous from possession, so may 
these, all exquisite as they are. Remember I have a 
lovely little craft, well armed, and formed for peace or war, 
as occasions serves, merely lacking an enterprising officer ; 
such a one as I once thought you would prove, — but I 
was mistaken." 

" Where, De Ruyter, is she ? You never told me of 
this. Come, where is she ? " 

" You forget your toddy, your cudgeree-pots, and pas- 
toral life. ,> 

" Oh no, I don't ! But, let us just have a look at the 
craft. How is she rigged ? Where does she He ? How 
many tGns ? How many men ? What is she to be em- 
ployed in ? " 

" By no means. You appear so admirably adapted for 
a baboo life, you had better go on with old Saboo. Per- 
haps next year you may like to take a tour among the 
islands, and pick up a few Persian and Hindoo girls, for 
the propagation of peasantry ; — is that in your Law of 
Nature ? " 

Thus he went on, bantering and laughing, but would 
give no reply to my questions regarding the vessel. As 
he was in the habit of journeying in the night, as soon as 
the great bear shone on the verge of the heavens, he shook 
my hand, threw a bag of pagodas on the table, bade me 
deny myself nothing money could procure, promised to 
be with me in a few days, and returned to Bombay. 



A YOUNGER SON. 85 



CHAPTER XXIII. 

I could not choose but gaze ; a fascination 
Dwelt in that moon, and sky, and clouds, which drew 
My fancy thither, and, in expectation 
Of what I knew not, I remained. Shelley. 

The night was such as is often seen in the East. Every 
near object, fruit and flower, illumined by the bright, 
deep, and liquid light of the moon and stars, was, in shape 
and colour, as distinguishable and clear as by day. The 
pale and softened tints, the bland and gentle air, fanning 
the drooping trees, formed a delightful contrast to the 
flaming and red-hot glare of the day, when the eyes are 
dazzled, and we gasp, as if under suffocation, in the hot 
atmosphere. I sat down on the green slope, listened to 
the hooting of the owls, and watched the flitting of the 
large vampire bats round the tank, until I fell asleep. 
My dreams were of De Ruyter, of the Indian islands, of 
Walter ; but at last I started up at the abhorred voice 
of the Scotch lieutenant, saying, " How now, Sir ! — 
asleep on your watch ! — gae to the mast-head and waken 
yoursel ! " Looking up, I beheld not that snarling cur, 
but honest old Saboo, who was waking me with this warn- 
ing, " No good sleep in sun ; make sick ; house good 
to sleep/' I was cold and cramped. The sun was up. 
Ordering some toddy, I went down to the tank, plunged 
in, and was myself again. 

The quiet and happy time I passed here was uncon- 
taminated by disgust. However, I had resumed a jacket 
and trowsers, my skin not being musquito proof; and> 
having inadvertently trampled on a nest of young centi- 
pedes, I was glad to replace my shoes. 

From my earliest remembrance, I was subject to occa- 
sional melancholy ; but not of the gloomy kind ; rather 
a pleasing and soothing sensation than otherwise. This 
solitude was well adapted to awaken the shadowy phan- 
toms that are created in the imagination. Mingled with 
g 3 



86 



ADVENTURES OF 



these, realities forced themselves upon me ; and at last f 
began to ponder on my singular position. There was a 
strangeness and mystery in the actions and pursuits of 
De Ruyter, which I could not develope, and which fasci- 
nated and spell-bound my spirit. The rapidity with which 
he had gained an influence over me w T as marvellous. His 
frankness, courage, and generosity — the nobleness of his 
nature -*- his liberal and enlightened sentiments, so unlike 
the merchants and money-traders I had seen, convinced 
me he was none of them. After reflecting on his words, 
and what I had witnessed of his conduct, I concluded he 
was commander of a private ship of war. But then neither 
the English nor the Americans had any in India; the 
French indeed had something of the sort; but, if under 
their flag, what did he in an English port, and apparently 
on friendly terms there ? My next conclusion was that 
he was an agent of some of the Rajahs, who still were 
independent sovereigns, although the Company were draw- 
ing their circles within circles around them, till they be- 
came driven from their fastnesses to the plain, to fall on 
any prey. These princes, whether at peace or war, were 
known to have secreted agents in the presidencies, to trans- 
mit to them early intelligence of the movements and policy 
of the Company's residents. De Ruyter seemed admir- 
ably fitted for this service ; though he could not, or did 
not, care always to disguise his indignation at what he 
thought the barbarous policy, intolerance, and arrogance 
of the Anglo-Indian dictation in India. His brow used 
to darken, his lip to quiver, and his eye to dilate, as he 
narrated, with thundering voice, instances of its cruelty, 
extortion, and presumption. Yet he liked England, and 
individuals of that nation, though he preferred those of 
America, his adopted country. He observed, ee It is 
curious that all nations who are blessed with the greatest 
portion of liberty at home, govern their colonies with the 
most remorseless and unmeasured despotism/' Then he 
would add, " Fortunately for mankind, it .is so ; it forms 
the only hope of freedom's being ever universal. When 
goaded past endurance, the most patient animal will turn, 
armed with the invincibility which despair gives ; — the 



A YOUNGER SON. 87 

wild cat will do so against the tiger, — I have seen him 
do it." 

This, and much more, which I now remembered of De 
Ruyter, convinced me he was not what he seemed, but left 
me still in doubt as to what he really was. If my surmises 
were well grounded, I felt I should like him the better ; 
and I entertained not the slightest hesitation in placing 
myself under his pilotage, from every thing I had seen of 
him. He was after my own heart. 

He sent me frequent notes and messages ; and as his 
departure was protracted, I could no longer refuse Walter's 
pressing invitation ; so that one evening I mounted a horse 
he had provided for me, and on the following night I was 
canopied under his comfortable tent. He took a boyish 
delight in pointing out and particularising all his comforts 
and advantages, contrasting them with his early privations 
and sufferings. As not a particle of envy was in my dis- 
position, I participated in his feelings. He had already 
become a favourite with the officers ; and having told them 
part of my story, we were hale-fellows the first night I 
passed in the camp. Escorted by a party of them, I 
returned in a palanquin to my old quarters in Bombay. 

My time passed agreeably, either in the camp, or at the 
bungalo, where I made parties, or at the tavern in Bom- 
bay ; De Ruyter joining us when not employed about his 
affairs, — or business, as he called it. 



CHAPTER XXIV. 

Man, who man would be, 
Must rule the empire of himself; in it 
Must be supreme, establishing his throne 
On vanquished will, quelling the anarchy 
Of hopes and fears, being himself alone. Shelley. 

De Ruyter now took me on board of an Arab grab brig, re- 
markable for its lean, wedge-like, and elongated bow. She 
c 4 



88 ADVENTURES OP 

was rigged as an hermaphrodite ; and, as is the custom 
with the Arabs, she had disproportionate square-yards. 
Her crew were partly Arabs ; and the remainder, by their 
colour and dress, showed they were of various castes. She 
was unloading a cargo of cotton, and spices, purchased, I 
was told, by the Company. De Ruyter very seldom went 
on board of her ; but her captain, called the Rais, was daily 
with him. They generally met on board a small and very 
singular craft, called a dow. She was chiefly manned with 
Arabs : but to my surprise the sprinkling among them was 
of European seamen, Danes and Swedes, with two or three 
Americans. These were secreted on board, for what pur- 
pose I did not then know ; but I was especially cautioned 
not to mention the circumstance on shore. This dow had 
a large mast forward, and giggermast aft. She was the 
clumsiest and most unsightly craft I had ever seen in 
India. Her head and stern, raised and raking, were of 
light bamboo work. She seemed crank, and to have little 
hold of the water. On De Ruyter's asking me if I should 
like to have the command of her, I answered, (e Yes ; 
when I cannot get a catamaran, or masuli boat, I may 
possibly hazard my carcass on board her/' 

" I see you are particular," said he. c< Now, though 1 
have my choice, I shall, from preference, go to sea in her. 
Perhaps you, being fastidious, may prefer the grab ? " 

« Why," I replied, " knock the shark's head off her 
and ship a bowsprit in its place, with a lick of tar and 
paint, and I should be well content to take a cruise in her. 
Besides, I like the look of those Arabs, and of those savage, 
lean, wild-eyed fellows, with their red caps, jackets and 
turbans. I never saw cleaner or lighter-made fellows to 
fly aloft in a squall, or board an enemy in battle." 

" Yes, they are our best men, and come from Dacca ; 
and they'll fight a bit, I can tell you." 

" But then I should like to have something to fight 
with." 

" O, she has guns ! " 

" I hate those pea-shooter-looking things on her gunnels. 
A few twelves, or short twenty-fours, would not be too 
much for her. She has a beautiful water line, and a run 



A YOUNGER SON. SQ 

aft like a schooner. Her bow is of the leanest ; and her 
beam being so far aft, I doubt she pitches damnably in a 
swell. Nevertheless there is a varment and knowing look 
about her which I like/' 

' ' Well, will you run her down the coast to Goa ? I '11 
follow in the old dow. When the sun sets, get on board, 
and weigh with the land wind. You see she is already 
removed into the roadstead, and ready for sea. At daylight 
I shall get under weigh. I have told the Rais that you 
are going in the grab, and to obey you. I '11 give you a 
few notes , in case of an accident separating us, though it 
is not probable. Come along. Remember you are a pas- 
senger to Goa. Not a word more to Walter ! When we 
get into blue water, you shall know every thing. Are you 
satisfied ?" 

' c I am. I should not have held on so long with- 
out questioning, had I not entire confidence in you, De 
Ruyter. Where you go, never doubt but I '11 follow. I 
have not a very squeamish stomach, and am no change- 
ling/' 

" Very well ! But have one thing uppermost in your 
mind : before you can govern others, you must be perfect 
master of yourself. That you may be so, do not, like a 
girl, let words or gestures betray your purpose. A loose 
word spoken in passion, or an embarrassed look, may mar 
your designs, however ably planned. Above all things do 
not indulge in wine ; for that, they say, opens the heart ; 
and who but a fool would betray himself, perhaps to those 
on the watch to entrap him ? " 

iC You know I drink but little." 

" True ; but now I wish you not to drink at all." 

On my staring at him, he smiled and said, u That is, 
for the present. If you do indulge, do so with tried friends 
only. But you had better not drink ; for I know you can 
more easily abstain altogether, than follow a middle course. 
Is it not so?" 

" I believe you are in the right." 

After our return on shore, stopping near the tavern, he 
said, " Give your orders to these boatmen as to the things 
you want. You'll find almost every thing you can have 



90 ADVENTURES OF 

occasion for on board ; and that is lucky for you, as you 
are a most heedless person." 

Just before the sun had sunk to rest, I received De 
Ruyter's parting instructions, shook hands with him, and 
leapt into the boajt. The Rais, who spoke English very 
well, received me on board, and showed me into the cabin. 
I gave him a letter from De Ruy ter ■ he put it to his fore- 
head, read it, and asked me at what time I wished to get 
under weigh, as he was referred to me. I answered, at 
twelve ; such were my instructions. I bade him hoist the 
boats in, stow them, and have every thing prepared for sea. 

While he executed these orders, I looked over De Ruy- 
ter's pencilled memorandums. Though. I certainly under- 
stood I was to have the command of the vessel, if I wished 
it, I could not account for the strange way in which it was 
enforced upon me. The Rais would do nothing without my 
orders. " Well/' thought I, " with all my heart ! To- 
morrow we shall meet the dow, and then De Ruyter will 
enlighten me." 

Mine had been such a dog's life in those situations in 
which my guardians had placed me, that I could not possibly, 
seeking my fortunes blindfold, stumble on any thing more 
miserable ; so that not only without hesitation, but with a 
joyful alacrity, my mind was instantly made up to execute 
any thing De Ruyter, the only person who seemed inter- 
ested in my fate, thought fit to employ me in. I took a 
hasty turn or two on the deck, with a firm step and proud 
glance, which command gives ; and spoke with kindness 
to the Serang and others, as a man does in the fresh bloom 
of office. 

Though the vessel was in a disorderly trade-like trim, 
she was not deficient in the essentials of defensive, if not 
offensive warfare. Her masts and sails, with the coir 
running rigging, had a slovenly look to a man-of-war- 
man's eye ; and, from the want of tar and paint, she had a 
bronze hue. Notwithstanding, on a close inspection, you could 
see she had been fitted up with great care in all essential 
points, and with many of the modern European improve- 
ments. In measurement she was about three hundred tons, 
but could stow little more than half. She had a deep waist 



A YOUNGER SON. 9* 

pierced with port-holes for guns ; but battened in, except 
the two forward and four after ones, which had six long 
nine-pounders. Her gunnels were armed with swivels. 
Her forecastle was raised ; and abaft she had a low poop, 
or half-deck, under which was the principal cabin. As 
the last stroke on the gong sounded eight o'clock, the 
sailors' supper time, I instinctively returned to this after- 
cabin ; the grave, which time had dug in my stomach 
since mid-day, yawning to be filled up. Swarms of men, 
with the same intention, hastened from below, squatted on 
their heels in small circles, divided by caste, and turned to 
with their messala (messes), of rice, ghee, dried bumbalo, 
curry, fresh fruit, and dried chillies. 

Having filled up the aforesaid vacuum, I lay down on 
the couch, smoked De Ruyter's hooka, and took an inven- 
tory of the cabin. It was low, but roomy ; and well 
lighted and cooled from the stern ports. There were too 
sleeping berths on the opposite sides; and in the spaces 
between them and the upper deck were two stars of pistols ; 
that is, fourteen or sixteen pistols in each, with their 
muzzles together, their butts forming the radii. The fore 
bulk-head was closely ribbed with bamboo spars ; the outer 
portion was ranged with musquets; and there was a gar- 
nish of bayonets, and jagged Malayan creeses, arrayed in 
most fanciful forms. This was the " fitting for war," as 
De Ruyter called it. Then the after part was certainly 
dedicated to peace, its shelves being crammed with books, 
writing materials, and nautical instruments ; and the ceil- 
ing, low as it was, had a number of rolled charts suspended 
between the beams ; while in the middle of the centre- 
beam swung the transversed compass. In other nooks and 
corners were telescopes ; and, though less picturesque, yet 
equally indispensable, such articles as I had called in requi- 
sition for my supper. 

Not being forbidden to sleep, nor having the fear of 
punishment over my head for neglect of duty, I was wake- 
ful and alert. My mind was occupied by the responsi- 
bility with which my friend had intrusted me. I* walked 
the deck, gazing at the dog- vane, to see it wooed by the 
land wind ; but, as De Ruyter said, it was near twelve 



92 ADVENTURES O* 

before this took place. Then I ordered the Rais to get 
under weigh, and, if possible, without noise. The first, 
he said, was easy work; but the last impossible. We 
weighed our anchor, and went to sea. 



CHAPTER XXV. 

With thee, my bark, I '11 swiftly go] 

Athwart the foaming brine ; 
Nor care what land thou bear'st me t, 

So not again to mine. 

Welcome, welcome, ye dark blue waves ! 

And, when you fail my sight, 
Welcome ye deserts and ye caves ! 

My native land, good night ! Byron. 

All whose physical and mental powers, no matter of what 
metal they are composed, are forced into premature 
developement by artificial means, or by the communication 
of cities, attain the rapid- and wire-drawn growth of plants 
and herbs in the dense shelter of a forest. Early they put 
forth their leaves and buds, but seldom if ever more; or 
if they do produce fruit, it is unwholesome and nauseous. 
When transplanted from their shelter in the open spaces of 
the world, the first frost or storm destroys them. So it is 
with animals : the power of the high-bred racer, forced by 
exciting food and clothing, does indeed give an early pro- 
mise of strength, but never realised. He is cut of? in the 
dawn of his prime, with all the symptoms of age and decay. 
There are in the north some few men, and women too, 
who, without this care and culture, spring up into their full 
growth with the marvellous rapidity of the east ; and the 
germs of life and hardiness within them are not to be sub- 
dued, perceptibly, by time or toil ; so that, at the age when 
ordinary beings become extinguished, these iron ones yet 
hold their ground, sturdy and upright. Such were the 
patriarchs of the olden time ; and now that the world is 
more ripe with war, disease and adventure, diminishing 



A YOUNGER SON. Q3 

their numbers, yet such beings are to be found, was outlive 
all kin and kind, who cease to count time by years, but 
refer to the page of history and past events, and wonder of 
what malady a brother died at fourscore. 

Though not one of these granite pillars, I gave token, 
not artificially, of belonging to their hardy breed; for, 
at this period of my life, I had attained the attributes of 
perfect manhood. I was six feet in stature, robust, and 
bony, almost to gauntness ; and, with the strength of ma- 
turity, I had the flexibility of limb which youth alone can 
give. Naturally of a dark hue, my complexion readily taking 
a darker from the sun, I was now completely bronzed. 
My hair was black, and my features perfectly Arab. At 
seventeen I looked to be seven-and- twenty. Then, having 
in extreme youth been left to jostle my way through the 
crowd, I had made a proportionate advance in what is 
called worldly knowledge, which experience alone, not 
years, can teach. 

In the way I have related the course of my first acquaint- 
ance and subsequent friendship with De Ruyter, I am fearful 
that some may be impressed with an erroneous idea that he 
was selfishly working on the malleability of my youth. I 
can speak now with proof of his having been assayed on the 
touchstone of time, and found true gold. De Ruyter himself 
was in reality a friendless wanderer ; a man self-exiled, from 
out the pale of civilisation and its ties ; and with a highly 
wrought imagination, and cultivated mind, it was natural 
he should seek objects to lavish his affections on, and who 
could sympathise with him. Such were not easy to be found 
where he was, and in his unsettled way of life. With the 
semibarbarians of the East it was out of the question ; and 
the European- adventurers were scattered about, busy in the 
accumulation of wealth, or exclusively engaged in their own 
separate views of ambition. The few renegado sailors he 
could pick up from time to time were either deserters, or 
deserted for their worthlessness. A few associates he had 
liked were removed by death, or, what is the same thing, 
distance. He was not formed for an Asiatic : his free and 
buoyant nature impelled him to seek companionship ; and 
having perhaps no predilection at that period, as accident 



94 adventub.es op 

cast me in his way, his feelings were interested in my 
behalf. He had perfectly seen through me during that 
period, though short yet full of matter ; and nothing 
doubted but that, with a little time and guidance, I should 
become what he wished me to be. He perceived that, 
added to the fresh and warm feelings of youth, I pos- 
sessed honesty, sincerity, and courage, not yet soiled and 
way-worn by journeying through the sloughs of the 
world, which few can pass without defilement. The step 
he took, therefore, was not so preposterous as superficial 
lookers-on might conclude. From the hour in which I had 
consummated my revenge on the lieutenant, in a manner 
which cut off the possibility of my return to the navy, De 
Ruyter, seeing I was utterly friendless, became my friend in 
its true sense, and ever after treated me as such ; so that if 
fathers followed his example, we should have less of that 
eternal and mawkish cant about filial disobedience, dull as 
it is false, spawned on society by dry and drawling priests, 
and incubated by the barren sect of mouldy, soddened blues. 
His disposition, or restlessness, caused his to be a life of 
adventure, and consequently of peril. I was a scion of the 
same stock; my inclinations homogenial; and whether I 
had met with him or not, I should have run my destined 
course, though not on the same ground. 

As I am writing more for my own gratification, and to 
beguile the now weary hours, than for strangers, they must 
be content to give me cable and range enough, while nar- 
rating this part of my history, which, however dry and 
tedious to them, is to me the most interesting. And who 
that lives, and has a heart not grown sabre-proof, does not 
glow with pleasure at the remembrance of what he did and 
felt from seventeen to twenty ? With some, both earlier 
and later remembrances may be equally delightful. Not so 
with me ; for at twenty-one I was like a young steer taken 
from the pasture to the shambles ; or like the wild horse, 
selected from the herd, and lazoed by the South American 
gauchoes in the midst of my career. The fatal noose was 
cast around my neck, my proud crest humbled to the dust, 
the bloody bit thrust into my mouth, my shaggy mane 
trimmed, my hitherto untrammelled back bent with a 



A YOUNGER SON. 9^> 

weight I could neither endure nor shake off, my light and 
springy action changed into a painful amble, — in short, I 
was married ; and married to — but I must not antedate 
my European adventures. For the present I must en- 
deavour to forget it, that I may relate my actions in India 
with the open and fiery spirit which freedom gives ; not in 
the subdued tone of a shackled, care-worn, and spirit- 
broken married man of the civilised West. 

We gently glided out of the port, with just enough of air, 
as sailors express it, to lull the sails to sleep. At daylight, 
the port and harbour still in sight on our lea-beam, we dis- 
cerned the sluggardly old dow under weigh, creeping along 
the land like a tortoise. At noon a breeze sprung up from 
the S.W. ; and at sunset, relieved by distance from all ap- 
prehension of our movements being watched by the port, I 
bore up, ran some leagues in shore, shortened sail, and hove 
to. As I had anticipated, with the earliest dawn, when 
the grey mists evaporated and left a clear line of horizon, 
it was first broken, as I swept it round with a telescope, by 
the old dow, like a black spot on the light blue sea, on the 
bow. I ordered the helmsman to bear up ; and with a 
press of sail we came down on her at eight o'clock. I hailed 
her, and De Ruyter came on board. We again hauled our 
wind, and continued our course along the land. 

De Ruyter then retired with me to breakfast in the cabin, 
inquiring of me what I thought of the grab. " She seems 
to move," I said,, u independently of the wind. We passed 
a man-of-war brig yesterday, as if she were a rock." 

ie Yes, in such a light air as this, nothing will come 
near her. In a heavy head-sea, she does indeed pitch 
heavily. But if not over-pressed, she is light, buoyant, and 
holds a good wind. Therefore, don't press sail on her, or 
she will be buried." 



96 



ADVENTURES OP 



CHAPTER XXVI. 



Half ignorant they turned an easy wheel. 
That set sharp racks at work, to pinch and peel. 

Why were they proud ? Because their marble founts 
Gush'd with more pride than do a wretch's tears? 

Why were they proud? Because fair orange mounts 
Were of more soft ascent than, lazar stairs ? 

Why were they proud ? Because red-lined accounts 
Were richer than the songs of Grecian years ? 

Why were they proud ? again we ask aloud, 

Why in the name of Glory were they proud ? Keats. 

De Ruyter, after some other nautical talk, veered round to 
the point of the compass I desired, commencing with, — 
".What I told you at Bombay was true ; — I was a mer- 
chant there. Now, having concluded my mercantile task, 
I am ready for freighting or fighting ; but I am generally 
compelled to begin with the latter. I pursue no invariable 
line of action ; both I and the grab are transmutable." 

" How are we to shape our course now ? " 

" Why, in this wide sea, and amidst the conflicting 
broils and wars of European adventurers, and native princes, 
and rajahs, — besotted barbarians, worrying and flying at 
each other's throats in contention about the pasture, while 
English wolves steal in and walk off with the cattle, — there 
can be no lack of employment, though it requires consider- 
ation to decide. First, we must run down the coast to Goa, 
where, having settled some business, and laid up the dow, 
we shall afterwards be together ; and then it will be time 
enough to decide on our after-movements. How old are 
you ? ' 

" I have turned seventeen.'* 

" That's odd ! — I took you for twenty. Well, — no 
matter your age. A green trunk often produces the ripest 
and richest fruit. A little more experience, which you will 
soon pick up in our bustling life, and a great deal more of 
command over your passions, and you will lack little of the 
essential qualifications to fit you for any thing on sea or on 
shore. The choice is entirely yours. If you like land- work, 



A YOUNGER SON. 97 

I have some friends scattered about, who, for your own 
sake, as well as mine, will be glad to employ you. If you 
stay with me, I need not say that you are most welcome. 
But mine is a rough life ; and if you are to judge of my 
actions by the common canting sophistry of public opinion, 
you may pronounce their legality as something more than 
questionable, and had better not hazard your reputation." 

cs Hang that ! " I replied ; f€ with your permission I 
shall stay where I am. I told you before 1 wished to stay 
with you, and I repeat it. I don't want to know your 
plans till I have experience enough to aid you with my 
counsel." 

" Nc ; you are a man in intellect, and have more firmness 
than most men I have had to deal with. For some things 
I have done, those devouring locusts of Europe have de- 
nounced me a buccanier. These sordid fellows, who would 
squeeze their fathers' eyes out without compunction, if they 
were nutmegs, will let no man warm his blood with spice, 
or cool it with tea, unless they have their profit, or, as it is 
called, their dustoory. They would monopolise every thing, 
and wherever there is gain, let them but once hit on the 
scent, they'll hunt it out through blood and mire, and 
admit no sharers in the spoil. Now, I like spice and tea 
too ; and their system of exclusive right not suiting with 
my ideas of things, I began to open a trade for myself. 
They denounced me, seized my vessel, and left me bank- 
rupt. Well ! I did not rot in a jail, nor sit down in abject 
despair, nor waste my breath in beggarly petitions. I am 
not one of those spiritless cravens. I went forth again, 
alone like the lion, no longer circumscribed within the 
narrow limits of a paltry burgher, but determined on making 
reprisals, and returning blow for blow, no matter whence it 
came. In the interval, however, between my ruin and 
return to the sea, I gratified my longing to see the interior 
of India, and traversed the greatest part of it. I sojourned 
some time with Tippoo Sahib. He alone had the ingredients 
of greatness in his composition. I accompanied him to 
some of his principal battles, — but you know his fate. I 
-was, at that time, one of those visionary enthusiasts, im- 
pelled, by an ardent love of liberty, to try to breast the stream 



98 ADVENTURES OF 

which heaves the weak onward unresistingly. Like a petty 
mountain -torrent contending with a mighty river, I foamed 
and struggled to maintain my purpose; but in vain, — I 
was borne on like the rest, till, mingled with them, I became 
lost in the wide ocean. Foolishly I thought that men might 
be induced to lay aside their paltry interests for a season , 
and let their passions sleep, like scorpions in the winter, till 
the sun of freedom dawned, and gave them leisure, un- 
disturbed by foreign invasion, to resume their civil and 
religious discord. I conjured princes and priests (the world's 
attorneys) to relax their gripe on each other's throat, till 
the general enemy were driven from the shore to the sea 
from whence they came. But truth is a sword in a child's 
hand, dangerous to himself alone. My doctrine was thought 
damnable. I narrowly escaped adding my name to the list 
of martyrs. Every where throughout the east I saw the 
necessity of a great moral revolution. The old system is 
there in all the grey and hoary Rightfulness of desolation 
and decay ; and will remain dreary and hideous, till an 
entirely new one shall spring up. Time alone can effect 
this ; and the efforts of hands like mine to hasten his tor- 
toise-steps are puerile." 

" It seems to me," I observed, " that we have not much 
to brag of in Europe. There is room for alteration ; and 
men's minds, and hands too, are already at the work of re- 
generation." 

" Ay, but for themselves alone, as among the natives 
here. Europe is an old man's child, an unnaturally begotten 
and wrinkled abortion, created out of the shattered frag- 
ments of the wreck of theEast, pieced and joined ingeniously 
together, but without solidity. It is an antique bronze, 
patched and smeared with whitewash, a plaster miniature 
copy from a granite statue. The finger of destruction is 
already upon it, like a Spartan mother's on her puny off- 
spring. Thus thinking, I was roused from my dreams of 
reformation ; and, having expended my gold, and wanting 
bread, I turned round, resolved henceforth to go- with the 
stream, and say, with the wise philosopher, ancient Pistol, 
— ' the world's mine oyster, which I with sword will open.* 
I returned to the sea, went to the Mauritius, fitted out an 



A YOUNGER SON. 99 

armed vessel on credit, and quadrupled my former capital; 
-— it was but fair I should have interest for my money, 
My person is not much known ; however, I seldom trust 
myself in any of the residences. My visit to Bombay was 
to achieve animportant object — not to dispose of the paltry 
cargo of the grab. Yet," laughing, he continued, ic if they 
had grabbed me there ! Why, what do you think ? That 
very cargo they have paid for — once at least, as I have 
vouchers for that — and perhaps twice, if the original vend- 
ers have not been defrauded of it. Six months ago, cruising 
in this grab, under French colours, I cut off a lazy Com- 
pany's ship from Amboyna, lagging astern of her convoy, 
— that was her cargo ! I have intelligence of some more 
of them loading at Banda, and perhaps we may fall in with 
them. When they are swollen up like leeches, I know 
where to put my thumb on them, and squeeze them till 
they disgorge. What say you ? " 

" With all my heart !" I answered. " But, till I came 
here, I always heard that our colonies were for the protec- 
tion of the poor devils, they not being able to take care of 
themselves, and for their conversion to Christianity; — then, 
when baptised and civilised, emancipation will follow." 

et Truly so it will, — when they are converted. It is 
curious, though now so few stomachs are gross enough to 
retain cant or caster oil, that every quack thinks he has a 
method of insinuating either of them down the throat 
without nausea. We are drenched, whether we will or no. 
with oil of cant, as a panacea for all complaints. This h 
certainly the age of gold, for who values any thing else ? 
Women, saints, and philosophers squabble now for nothing 
but loaves and fishes. Who speculates on any other sub- 
ject than how to fill his purse ? And what is not to be 
attained by gold, from kingdoms to mitres and maidens ? 
This merchant-company say they have an exclusive right 
(which is a general wrong) to the entire produce of this 
great empire. On what a grand scale is robbery now car- 
ried on ! Petty plundering is out of fashion, and put to 
shame. The mighty thieves have now enclosed that 
beautiful island, — I wonder we are allowed to inhale its 
fragrant odours ! " 

h 2 



100 ADVENTURES OP 

"What! Ceylon!" 

cc Yes ; they have there a ring-fence of posts, in which 
the King of Candy is enmeshed. He calls the English 
beach-masters, hut soon will they he his masters. Jungle, 
reptiles, nor fever, can hold back those led on by insatiable 
avarice, till glutted with entire possession. The other 
spice-islands will follow. Then no rock so bare but they 
will covet, and convert to their own purposes. Yet their 
reign will be but as a day ; the time of just retribution 
will come, and that speedily." 

" You are too sweeping in your strictures, De Ruyter. 
At least, they make a show of doing some good. They 
have established schools, built churches, started newspapers^ 
— which are the banners of freedom." 

" It is but showing false colours ! The schools are for 
their own offsets ; the churches to provide for knaves ; 
and their printing, being entirely under their own censor- 
ship, is one canto of premeditated lies for exportation. 
As for priests, — better the pkgue had crossed the equa- 
tor ! They are a well-sifted compound of bigots and 
fools, of knaves, Jesuits, presbyterians, moravians, and the 
bilious tribe of croaking, beetle-browed, ravenous, obscure 
dissenters. We had venomous reptiles enough before they 
were let loose on us." 

(i You are now growing scurrilous, if not blasphemous. 
Remember they have made converts even of some of your 
own men." 

" They have converted honest men into hypocrites, like 
themselves ; but if I catch any more on board, I'll keel- 
hale them. As long as there are beggars and outcasts, 
and they give rice and arrack, a sprinkling of water on the 
forehead won't stand in the way of a meal and a glass of 
grog down their throats." 

i( A few honest men there must be among them." 

<e Perhaps so ; but their being here is no proof of their 
wisdom. And what can they do ? Before they have 
become seasoned to the climate, and have learnt the lan- 
guage, most of them drop off. The rest devote themselves, 
not to saving souls from being damned, but to preaching 
damnation on each other. If their sacerdotal cloaks cover 



A YOUNGER SON. 101 

aught but hypocrisy, the Company know how to slake 
their holy zeal by letting them plainly see their labour is 
in vain. The vagabonds they do baptise are left. on their 
hands, unsaleable as rotten sheep ; for none of the Com- 
pany's servants are permitted to employ them ; nay, if 
before employed, they lose their bread with their caste, 
lest they should taint the flock. Merchants know that 
the many-faced and many-handed Bramah is a fit god for 
slaves ; they know also that they may keep their ground 
while the multitudinous conflicting castes of superstitious 
idolatry shall endure ; and that their tenure would be of 
little worth, if the natives were united in one religion. — 
But the sun is sinking in the wave ; and by its bloody 
mantle, and by the mares' tails streaming in the sky, we 
shall surely have a breeze. I have only this to add : I 
am no hungry dog, to stand patiently by, in the hope of 
picking a bone, which these lordly merchants, in general, 
pretty successfully blanch before they leave it. Let them 
gorge themselves undisturbed till, like the vulture, their 
weight is too heavy for their wings ; then we, like 
hawks, after hovering in watchfulness, will pounce upon 
them. No harm in despoiling robbers ! A convoy of 
Company's country craft, protected by their own cruisers, 
— whom I hold as trash for aping ships of war, — has 
sailed for the spice islands. By the by, you must trans- 
form your body, with an abbah, into an Arab's, — when 
they can't detect you. I have written full instructions. 
Continue your course to Goa, where I will follow. On 
no account go on shore till my arrival. The Parsee mer- 
chant, for whom I have prepared a letter, will do all you 
want. See, the breeze is springing up ! Haul the boat 
alongside ! " 

He shook my hand, jumped into the boat, and returned 
to the old dow. 



hS 



102 ADVBNTU RES OF 



CHAPTER XXVIL 



We can escape even now, 
So we take fleet occasion by the hair. * Shelley. 

Nothing particular occurred till our arrival at Goa. I 
had rigged myself in loose dark trowsers, and purple vest, 
with a high black cap of Astracan lamb's skin, a cashmere 
shawl round my waist, and a small creese stuck in it. 
My long dark elf-locks were shaven off, with the exception 
of one, on the crown, by which the black-eyed houris were 
to haul me into paradise. A roll of beetle nut, properly 
chinammed, stuck in, or was rather sticking out, of my 
cheek. My teeth were dyed in the bright red colour of 
chess-men ; and my bare neck, arms, and ancles were 
well greased and highly polished. The men gathered 
around in congratulation, declared unanimously that I 
must be, that I was decidedly, Arab, and even went so far 
as to demand who was my father, and of what tribe. 

I lay to, off the point of Cape Ramas, all night, await- 
ing the dow, passed under the fort of Aguada, and an- 
chored in the harbour of Goa. The sun rose magnifi- 
cently, glittering on the marble monasteries, and on the 
ruined arches and colleges of the old town, spread over an 
extent which showed it had once been a nourishing city. 
The bunder, or pier, was breached by the sea, and in the 
harbour was nothing but a motley assemblage of country 
small craft. I sent the Rais on shore with the ship's 
papers and the letter to the merchant. In the evening the 
dow came to an anchor under our stern ; and at night-fall 
De Ruyter was again with me. 

On the following day he went up the country to meet 
some agents of the Rajah of Mysore, and a Mahratta 
prince ; leaving me at Goa to discharge the remaining 
part of the cargo, consisting of coffee and rice, and to take 
in ballast, and to complete our water. When he returned 
to Goa, I saw with him a Greek and a Portuguese, whom 



A YOUNGER SON. 103 

I believed to be spies in his employment. They used to 
meet in the ruins of a monastery or college in the old 
town, close to the sea, always at night. On these occasions 
De Ruyter came on board for one of the grab's boats, 
which landed him there. Their conferences were from 
twelve to two, a. m. The crew of the boat was even 
selected by De Ruyter. 

Having got every thing ready for sea, we removed all 
the men, and what else was useful, from the old dow, 
which was here given up to her owners. I warped out- 
side the harbour, and every night at sunset I hoisted the 
boats in, and hove short, lying in readiness to move on 
the instant. On the tenth day after our arrival, one hour 
after midnight, I observed, by the phosphoric light spark- 
ling on the black surface of the water, something approach- 
ing us with unusual rapidity. The hallooing and distant 
turmoil in the harbour was hushed ; the moving lights on 
the shore had been some time extinguished, but just then 
I thought I descried some commotion on the pier. As the 
sound was borne off by the light air from the land, I dis- 
tinctly heard some one hailing a boat in the port. This 
was repeated louder and louder. Lights then reappeared 
along the beach, and I heard the noise of oars, and spars, 
and boats, as if moving from amongst others to the shore. 
The noise growing higher, I turned towards the first ob- 
ject which had caught my attention in the other quarter ; 
and, though all was silent there, I still distinguished the 
sparkling ripple in the waters, and the long arrowy line of 
light, such as a shooting star leaves in the heavens, or the 
wake of a boat darting on a calm sea in this climate. By 
the muffled sound of oars, and by the long and heavy 
strokes which De Ruyter had taught the men in his 
favourite boat, I knew her, and marvelled at her returning 
before whe wonted hour, and at the rapidity with which 
she approached. The noise in the harbour augmented. 
My mind misgave me that all was not right. I felt my 
heart flutter with anxiety of I knew not what. I called the 
Serang, who was asleep (the Rais being with the boat), 
told him to rouse the men^ and, in my impatience, kicked 
them up myself. 

h 4 



104 ADVENTURES OF 

Ordering them to man the capstan, loose the jib and 
fore -top- sail, and cast off the lashings of the fore and aft 
mainsail, I returned to the gangway ; where now seeing 
our boat, I hailed her. Instead of the usual reply of 
<e Acbar," a voice answered in a low and suppressed tone, 
" Yup ! Yup ! " (silence ! silence !) I had been instructed 
regarding this signal, and, rushing to the bow, I seized the 
axe lying by its side in readiness, then, ordering the jib to 
be hoisted to pay her round, cut the cable, together with 
a chip from an Arab's leg, who was standing by it. 

De Ruyter then came forward, and said : " That was 
right, my boy, in cutting the cable ; but be cool, — you 
have wounded this poor fellow, — send him into the 
cabin. Clap all the canvass on her instantly. I'll go aft. 
The blood-hounds have hit on a scent ; they think to find 
us like jungle-fowls at roost ; but they shall find a pan- 
ther, and he is never caught sleeping ! " 

He sprang aft. We wore slowly round; and, as I was 
cursing the length of her kelstow, and the lightness of the 
breeze, which made her so tardy in paying round, De 
Ruyter put his hand on my shoulder, and said, " Arm the 
men, * * * * ! — but only with their spears. Let no 
boat come alongside of us, or attempt it. Speak them 
fair; but if a man puts his hand on the ladder, spear him 
as you would a wild boar. There is no occasion for salt- 
petre, it makes a noise and has a bad smell. Harpoon 
them ! but not till I tell you. I must keep back, and not 
be seen. If they question you about De Witt, the mer- 
chant, say you know him not." 

Two boats were approaching, and the foremost hailed 
us with, " Grab, ahoy V I answered. They commanded 
me to heave to, as they wished to see the captain. I 
ordered the Serang to let the mainsail fall, and loose the 
top-gallant- sails, and replied, " We are going to sea. I 
have got my port clearances and ship's papers, all regu- 
larly signed at the proper offices. I can't lose this breeze. 
What do you want ? " 

" Heave to, sir, or we shall fire ! " 

cc You had better not/' I said. 

We had not yet got weigh enough on her to distance 



A YOUNGER SON. 105 

the first boat, which belonged to the captain of the port. 
Be Ruyter ordered the men to lie down on deck. He 
stood at the helm. He was jusfc calling to me to keep 
under cover, when, with a flash of light from the boat, a 
bail whizzed by my head, and went into the mast. In 
obedience to De Ruyter' s orders, I did not return it, much 
against my inclination. Soon after, as the boat was shoot- 
ing up to board us on the gangway, De Ruyter, bearing 
away, brought them under the lee quarter. Not being 
able to board us there, they lost some time, by falling 
astern, before they could re-use their oars. In this way 
(the breeze now freshening a little) we kept them off some 
time, during which not a word was spoken. De Ruyter 
remained at the helm, and I, with a party of men, stood 
ready, all armed with, spears, to prevent their boarding us. 
The other boat was nearing us, and both had fired many 
muskets ; but we, sheltered by the bulk-heads of the deep 
waist, were untouched. The foremost boat now got hold 
of the lee chains, and they were very coolly coining on 
board. De Ruyter said, Ci Cheelo, chae !" (Advance, 
boys !) when we thrust our spears through the port-holes, 
and three or four, with their leader, fell back, spitted, 
into the boat, yelling with pain. Notwithstanding an 
officer's commanding them to hold on, they would not ; 
but as the other boat was coming up under the stern, I 
cast off one of the after guns, ran it out of the stern port, 
and, hailing both the boats, I said, " If you pull another 
stroke in our wake, or play your fire- works off under our 
stern, you shall hear the roar of this brazen serpent. 
Command where you have power to enforce obedience ; 
you have none here." 

I blew the cotton match ; they saw the bright brass 
muzzle of the gun depressed to a line with the boat, when 
I could have blown them to pieces. They lay on their 
oars ; and their oaths and threats, mingled with the rip- 
pling of the waves, died away, while we, crowded with 
sail, majestically receded from the port, and beheld them 
returning from their bootless expedition to the shore. 



105 ADVENTUEES OF 



CHAPTER XXVIII. 



Th&slim canoe 
Of feather'd Indian darts about, as through 
The delicatest air. Keats. 



After taking the bearings of the land, De Ruyter patted 
me on the back, and said, e< Those who fight under the 
banner of silence are victorious, whilst noise and threats 
end in defeat. The force of air or fire, when concentrated 
and confined, is irresistible. Women, and weak people, 
and boys before they have learnt to bite, bluster and 
threaten. A silent man, with a drawn weapon, is to be 
dreaded, because he is determined. When a man vaunts 
or menaces, he is either afraid, or he wavers in his pur- 
pose — I have ever found it so. Come, you have made 
a proper beginning ! — why, your wariness exceeds that 
of the oldest and most experienced. What induced you 
to keep so much on the alert, that you were prepared to 
be under weigh before I even hailed you ? I thought the 
night-owls on shore had anticipated me, and were along- 
side of you." 

I told him the reasons which had impressed me with 
an idea that all was not right. " Well ! " he added, (i I 
had great confidence in you, and anticipated much when 
your judgment should be perfected by experience. But, 
in some natures, quickness of perception is in tuition, like 
instinct, — it is strange. But go, my lads, you have 
worked hard, and when overwrought we must have rest. 
Go to sleep ; I will keep the watch to -night.' ' He shook 
me as I lay half dozing, with my head on the hatchway, 
saying, " The night dew, with a land wind, is here as 
venomous as the serpent's bite; it is heavy with the 
vapours from the jungles. Good night !" Notwithstand- 
ing my objections to leave the deck, complaining of the 
heat, and urging that we might still be pursued, he was 
peremptory that I should go below. " No fear/' said he ; 



A YOUNGER SON. 107 

(c before daylight the eye of the eagle will not descry us,, 
though perched on the highest rock. Good night ! " 

The change of atmosphere, which takes place an hour 
before the night is seen to break into day, awoke me. I 
stumbled up the ladder on deck, and was only thoroughly 
roused by breaking my shins against a gun -bolt. De 
Ruyter was standing on a gun-carriage, looking over the 
stern with a night-glass; the moon was reflected on his 
face ; he looked haggard with watching, and his hair and 
moustachios were dank with dew. Saluting him, I requested 
he would go to rest, and apologised for my long sleep. cs I 
only wonder," was his answer, " you are up so early ; but 
the young and happy rest when the sun withdraws his 
light, and awaken when he unfolds his curtains. At my 
age you will keep company with the moon, and prefer the 
shadowy silence of night to the glaring day, which is the 
prelude of never ending, and never useful toil." 

We were standing to the southward and westward, 
under a press of canvass. The watch were sleeping in 
groups under cover of the half-decks. As the day broke, 
De Ruyter looked carefully around the horizon, and 
ordered the watch to be awakened to their diurnal duties, 
never ending on board a ship, and he ascertained the only 
sails in sight to be country vessels. Our distance from 
the harbour and land was such as to blend all minute 
points into an undefined mass, its dark outline broken by 
the fleecy clouds of morning, and enveloped in transparent 
vapours. We took our departure from the land, and De 
Ruyter retired to the cabin, pricked her run of the night 
on the chart, gave me directions how to steer, and when 
to call him, covered himself in his capote, and slept. 
Hauling up as he directed, I kept a S, E. course, to make 
the southernmost of the Lacadive Islands. 

In getting into the latitude of these islands, we were 
many days becalmed. My mind was then too elastic to 
be oppressed with weariness. I loved the sea in all its 
moods. During the day the duties of the ship occupied 
me ; and, notwithstanding the grab remained as stationary 
as if she had taken root, time seemed to keep pace with 
the swallow. My inclinations and duty were, for the first 



108 ADVENTURES OP 

time, blended together, and, from a drowsy boy, I all at 
once, as if by magic, became transformed into a most 
active and energetic man. 

De Ruyter wished to give his vessel a more warlike trim. 
We hoisted up four verdigrised brass nine-pounders, se- 
creted under the ballast on the kelstow, and mounted them. 
We fitted and filled shot-lockers on deck, made cartridges, 
and prepared two furnaces for heating shot red-hot. We 
put the magazine in order, made rockets and blue-lights, 
cleaned and whitewashed between decks, mustered and 
quartered the men, exercised them, and practised the guns 
and small arms, and I learned to use the spear and creese 
under the tuition of the Rais. 

We had fourteen Europeans, chiefly from the dow; 
they were Swedes, Dutch, Portuguese, and French. We 
had also a few Americans, together with samples of almost 
all the seafaring natives of India ; Arabs, Mussulmans, 
Daccamen, Cooleys, and Lascars. Our steward and purser 
was a mongrel Frenchman, the cabin-boy English, the 
surgeon Dutch, and the armourer and master-of-arms 
Germans, De Ruy ter was indifferent as to where his men 
were born, or of what caste they were ; he distinguished 
them by their worth alone, I was astonished at such 
dissimilar and incongruous ingredients being mingled to- 
gether with so little contention ; but it was the consummate 
art of the master-hand, his cool and collected manner, 
which regulated all : before a murmur was heard, he fore- 
stalled every complaint by a timely remedy. He himself 
was the most active and unwearied in toil, the first in 
every danger, and every thing he did was done quicker 
and better than it could have been by any other person. 
In short, he would have been, amidst an undistinguished 
throng of adventurers, in any situation of peril or enter- 
prise, by a unanimous voice, their chosen leader. The 
most unforeseen calamity, which struck the hardiest aghast, 
when all looked in hopeless despair, he was prepared to 
meet, not by submitting to it, but by an opposition equal 
to the emergency. This, however, must be shown in his 
actions, and I proceed with our voyage. 

On the fourth day, the sameness of the scene, the blue 



A YOUNGER SON. 109 

sky and blue sea, underwent a change. Masses of clouds 
began to move and meet until the horizon was overcast 
with gloom. We took in our light canvass, and double- 
reefed the top-sails. Cat's paws, or light airs, came scud- 
ding along the waters from all points of the compass, 
amidst pale streaks of lightning and low thunder. Then 
the rain fell in torrents, and the rippling of the sea, borne 
by the eddy- winds into puny waves contending for sway, 
subsided, and now, bending all one way, was accompanied 
by a steady breeze instead of a violent gale, which we had 
expected. The clouds evaporated in rain ; and, borne by 
a steady wind from the N.E., at daylight we came in 
sight of the Lacadive islands. 

The canoes of the natives here astonished me. They 
are called by Europeans, owing to the wonderful rapidity 
with which they sail, flying prows. One of them hull 
down on our lee beam, we going under a staggering top- 
gallant breeze eleven knots an hour, came up to windward 
of us, standing two points nearer the wind, and passed up 
as if we had been stationary. There was a short breaking 
sea : two or three of her men, standing on her outriggers, 
looked as if they flew on the waters. She dashed not over, 
but through the sea, and at times was quite enveloped in 
the spray, resembling the reaction of a water- spout after 
its breaking. 

De Ruyter drew a sketch, and gave me a description of 
the boat. " These untaught people/' he said, (C have 
achieved, in the construction of that vessel, the triumph 
and perfection of naval architecture, in which we, with all 
our learning, study, and encouragement, have not gone 
beyond our ABC, as far as concerns swiftness, dexterity 
in change of direction, the making no lee- way, and, above 
all, simplicity of working. They have done all this ; con- 
sequently the construction of their proa is, in every part, 
in contradistinction to our ideas of naval architecture. We 
build the head and stern of a vessel as dissimilar as pos- 
sible ; they construct them precisely of the same form and 
proportions. The sides of our vessels, on the other hand, 
are precisely the same ; but in the proa you see the sides 
altogether different. The proa never tacks, sailing indif- 



110 ADVENTURES OF 

ferently with either end foremost, as occasion serves ; hut 
the same side is constantly the weather one. The left, or 
lee-side, is flat as a plumb line can make it ; consequently 
she would capsise, the weather-side being rounded, and 
from her great length and narrow beam ; but, to prevent 
this, on the lee- side, an outrigger, made of bamboos, pro- 
jects considerably into the sea, and supports a heavy log 
of cocoa wood, shaped like a solid canoe. This gives her 
an immense artificial beam, without opposing much resist, 
ance to the water. Between this outrigger and the flat 
side of the proa, the water passes without obstruction, and 
is the cause both of her celerity, and that no lee-way is 
made. The proa itself, or body of the boat, is merely a 
few planks sewed together, and wadded between the seams 
with coir-oakum. Not a nail, nor a bit of metal, is about 
her. The sail is matting, the mast and yards are of bam- 
boo. When they want to go about, they bear away and 
bring what is then the stern to the wind, move the heel of 
the triangular sail till they fix it on the opposite end, and 
at the same time shift the boom into the opposite direction ; 
so that what was the stern is then the head, and a man to 
steer always remains at each of the extremities. It may 
be said of them that they keep pace with the wind. No 
European vessel, in any weather, ever had a chance with 
them. They are admirably adapted for the navigation of 
islands situated in the latitude of the trade- winds, being 
enabled to cross on a wind from one to the other, with as 
unerring a flight as a crane ; while, in our vessels, if we 
miss the object steered for, by making lee-way, we have 
great difficulty, and lose time in beating up. True it is 
they are of small capacity, adapted solely to the simple 
commerce of bartering superfluous productions for absolute 
necessaries. The ordinary Indian canoe would not serve 
their purpose ; it either foundered in sudden squalls, or 
was driven to leeward of its destined port. By their in- 
genuity they invented this simple alteration and addition, 
and attained the important results I have pointed out." 



A YOUNGER SON. Ill 



CHAPTER XXIX. 

And first one universal shriek there rush'd 

Louder than the loud ocean, like a crash 
Of echoing thunder ; and then all was hush'd 

Save the wild wind, and the remorseless dash 
Of billows ; but at intervals there gush'd, 

Accompanied with a convulsive splash, 
A solitary shriek, — the bubbling cry 
Of some strong swimmer in his agony. Byron. 

On nearing one of these islands, I went on shore to see the 
natives, and obtain fruit. In the night the breeze again 
died away. At daylight we saw two or three square- 
rigged vessels, about two leagues to the westward of us, 
lying becalmed. I boarded one of them, in a boat with 
ten men well armed ; and her Rais, who was in great ap- 
prehension, told me had been boarded off the Persian 
Gulf, by a large Malay brig, full of men. They had not only 
plundered him and two other vessels in his company, but 
killed several of his men, using them with great cruelty. He 
added, that this Malay had been cruizing at the entrance 
of the gulf, and had rifled a vast number of vessels. 

I brought the captain and some of his crew on board 
the grab. After De Ruyter had satisfied himself that the 
man's story, with all the particulars, was true, he instantly 
determined to look after the Malay. The Persians told 
him she was full of gold, and that her cargo was so rich, 
she had cast rich bales of Persian silk into the sea, not 
having** room to stow them. 

In the evening a light breeze sprung up, and we made a 
long stretch to the northward and westward, anticipating to 
fall in with her before she entered the straights of Malacca. 
We made a capital run in the ensuing days, kept a good 
look out, and daily boarded many country boats and vessels, 
hoping to learn intelligence of the pirate. Day and night 
we were most vigilant, and hourly our hopes were excited by 
some passing stranger, whom we all swore was the Malay, 
whom we chased, and then were as often chagrined at find- 
ing our hopes deceived, or, rather, at their deceiving us. 



H2 ADVENTURES OF 

De Ruyter' s patience was now exhausted. He had im- 
portant despatches for the Isle of France, and would brook 
no longer detention. We therefore reluctantly altered our 
course again to the southward, and, after running twenty 
or thirty leagues in that direction, at daylight, when the 
horizon was particularly clear, before the sun arose with 
his misty mantle, the man at the mast-head called out, u A 
large sail on the lee-bow !" 

Fearing she might be a man -of-war, I took a glass up 
to the mast-head; where, after straining my eyes to make 
her out, De Ruyter hailed me with, (i Well, what is she?" 

1 replied with confidence, " The Malay ! " 

" Which way is she standing ? " 

Ci She has not yet seen us, and her course is to the north- 
ward." 

Then I described her : and De Ruyter said, " Very pos- 
sibly you are right." 

I came on the deck. The horizon became misty ; and, 
as they had neglected to keep a look-out, we trusted we 
should get much nearer ere she discovered us. We bore 
down on her under every stitch of sail w T e could spread. 
The studding-sails we wetted with an engine for that pur- 
pose, to make them hold the light breeze better ; and at 
eight o'clock she saw us, and bore away. We had gained 
considerably on her; the head of her lower yards were 
then visible from our deck ; and De Ruyter said, " If the 
breeze holds till mid-day, she cannot escape us," 

There was an alacrity and a buzz of joy throughout 
our crew, intent for plunder. We pumped the water out, 
lightened her by throwing some tons of ballast overboard, 
winged and shifted the iron shot, cleared the decks for ac- 
tion, got the arms and boats ready for service and for 
hoisting out, and watched and antedated all the motions of 
the enemy, as the hawk does the curlew. 

At noon the breeze freshened, and we gained rapidly on 
her; nevertheless it was six p.m. before we came within 
long shot. We then kept up a fire from the bow-chasers. 
For some time she disregarded this. We had hoisted a 
French tri-coloured flag,De Ruyter, indeed, having a French 
letter of marque's commission, which he now produced for 



A YOUNGER SON. 113 

me to read, as the only person among the officers ignorant 
of that fact. The shots now falling over and on board 
of the Malay, her top-gallant sails were lowered ; and we 
ran up under her lee-quarter, shortened sail, and backed 
the top-sail. 

A Malay on board of us was desired to hail her. Her 
deck swarmed with men. We ordered her to send a boat 
with her papers on board of us ; and seeing they paid no 
attention to this order, De Ruyter again fired a shot over 
her. She returned this with a volley from four carronades, 
divers small swivels on her gunwales, and twenty or thirty 
match-lock muskets, when the pieces of old iron, glass, 
and nails, with which they were loaded, rattled against our 
rigging, and three of our men were wounded, u Damn 
their impudence ! " exclaimed De Ruyter, u they shall 
have enough of it ! " 

We opened and kept up such a heavy, low, and well- 
directed fire, manoeuvring with our broadside on her stern 
and quarters, that, in ten minutes, De Ruyter called out 
to cease firing, as we had not only silenced her fire, but 
entirely cleared her deck, cut her rigging to pieces, and 
shot away her rudder. Our boats were then ordered to be 
hoisted out, and, with thirty men in three boats, I shoved 
off to board her ; De Ruyter cautioning me to be par- 
ticularly careful against their cunning and treachery. 
"They must have been," said he, laughing, "a colony 
founded by the ancient Greeks, for they have all the cha- 
racteristics of my modern friend at Goa." 

We approached her warily. Not the smallest impedi- 
ment was opposed to us. Indeed nothing gave token that 
there was a being on board of her. I ordered the Rais, 
who commanded one boat, to board her on the bow with 
his Arabs ; whilst I, with a party, chiefly Europeans, and 
a gallant set of fellows they were, climbed up her orna- 
mented quarters and bamboo stern. On getting on board, 
we saw many dead and wounded on her deck, but nothing 
else. She was only about two- thirds decked, having an 
open waist, latticed with bamboo, and covered with mats. 
Her sails and yards were hanging about in confusion. We 
were now all on deck, and a party of men was preparing 
z 



114 ADVENTURES OF 

to descend between decks; when, while replying to De 
Ruyter's questions, I was suddenly startled at hearing a 
wild and tumultuous war-whoop, and springing forwards, 
I saw a grove of spears thrust up from below, which, pass- 
ing through the matting, wounded many of our men. I 
was certainly as much astonished at this novel mode of 
warfare as Macbeth at the walking wood of Dunsinane. 
Running round the solid portion of the deck, several spears 
were thrust at me, which I with difficulty escaped. Some 
of my men had retreated ; I ordered them to fire down 
below, through the open work. Most of the men belong- 
ing to the Rais, who were not wounded, had jumped over- 
board to regain their boat. 

Hailing De Ruyter, I informed him how the affair stood. 
He desired me to make fast a halser, which he would send 
me, to the ring-bolts of her bob-stays, secure it to her bow- 
sprit, and that then we should all return to the grab ; he 
being very careful of the lives of his men, and knowing 
that these pirates, when once they have made up their 
minds not to be taken, will abide by their resolution. I 
told him that if he had any hand-grenades, or fire-balls, I 
would rout them out. Though we had already made consider- 
able havoc among them, I was very anxious, as were all the 
Europeans, to go below at every hazard, but our native 
crew were opposed to this ; and seven or eight of us could 
have had little chance, unable, in the dark, to see our 
enemies, who would spear us from their lurking places, 
without endangering themselves. 

The crew were busy in handing our wounded men 
down into the boat. A Swedish lad, whom I valued for 
being an excellent sailor, had been wounded by a spear, 
driven through his foot, and was suffering great pain. 
Hastening forward to see him handed into the boat, I step- 
ped over a dying Malay, shot through the body before we 
boarded her. I had previously, in passing him, caught a 
glance at his peculiarly ferocious look, and the malignant 
expression of his broad and brutish face. His coarse, 
black, straight hair was clotted with blood from a wound 
in his head, apparently by a splinter. As I now stepped 
over him, I was arrested by his eye, surrounded by a rigid 



A YOUNGER SON. 115 

lid, and deeply imbedded above his high cheek-bone, the 
sunken pupil still glaring like a glow-worm in a dark vault. 
My foot slipped in the gore, and I fell on him ; when, as 
I was recovering myself, he griped me with his bony hand, 
and made a horrible effort to rise, but his extremities were 
stiff. He drew a small creese from his bosom, and with a 
last effort tried to bury it in my breast. The passion of 
revenge had outlived his physical powers ; its sharp point 
slightly grazed me, and he fell dead from the exertion, 
dragging me down, his hand still clenching like a vice. I 
could only extricate myself by slipping my arm out of my 
vest, and leaving it in his ghastly hand. iC Such men as 
these," I cried out, " are not to be conquered even by 
death ! Their very spirits fight and stab at us ! " 

De Ruyter became peremptory for our instant return, 
as the night was now coming on, and the Malays below 
had again opened a fire on us with their match-locks. 
With rage and disappointment I returned. 

We had now altogether eight wounded. On reaching 
the grab, De Ruyter observed, " There is no help for it ! 
We must try to tow her towards the land; when near the 
shore, they will perhaps escape by swimming. But I fear 
we shall not succeed in capturing her." 

As we filled our sails and towed her, a gang of men 
stood at our stern to fire at any object they could see 
moving on board of her. We found it difficult to tow 
her : not being steered, she yawed about, and in less than 
an hour they had contrived to cut the tow-rope. Under 
a cover of musketry we again made fast another, and kept 
up a continual fire on her bows. Nothing living was seen 
on her decks, yet again the halser was cut. We hailed 
her, as we often had done, but no answer was given. 

At daylight, De Ruyter came to the determination of 
sinking her ; which we reluctantly did, by opening a fire 
with our largest guns, and red-hot shot, which had been 
prepared during the night. Symptoms of fire from below 
soon made their appearance ; smoke slowly arose ; several 
explosions of powder took place ; the smoke arose darker, 
and in masses ; at last we saw the savages themselves 
crawling up on all-fours upon deck. Their guns having 
i 2 



IlG ADVENTURES OF 

been thrown overboard by us, they could make no defence. 
Streams of fire now burst out of her hatchways and port- 
holes. On the balls going through her, our Arabs swore 
they saw the gold-dust, and pearls, and rubies, fly out of 
her on the opposite side. I cannot say 1 did ; nor could 
I smell the otto of roses, which they affirmed was running 
out of her scuppers like a fountain. I saw nothing but the 
dense flames and smoke, and the poor devils swarming up 
and jumping into the waves, preferring death by water to 
fire and balls, — for they had no other choice. Though 
v/e lowered our boats to pick them up, not one approached 
them ; and the boats did not near the vessel, fearing her 
blowing up. She appeared to have an immense number 
of men ; not less than two hundred and fifty to three 
hundred. 

Having given over firing, we lay at some distance, in- 
tently gazing at her. After an explosion, louder than the 
loudest thunder, which vibrated through the air, we could 
see nothing but a black cloud on the waters., enveloping all 
around, like a pall, and darkening the heavens; and 
where the pirate had been was only to be distinguished by 
the bubbling commotion and dashing ripple of the sea, 
like the meeting of the tides, or where a whale has been 
harpooned, and sunk. Huge fragments of the ship, masts, 
tackling, and men, all shattered and rent, lay mingled 
around in a wide circle. Some dark heads, still above the 
surface, awaiting, as it were, the utmost of our malice, 
faintly yelled their last war-cry in defiance ; then a few 
bubbles showed where they had been. Her hull was 
driven down stern-foremost, and her grave filled up on the 
instant. 

Even the wind became hushed from the concussion of 
the explosion ; and I started as our sails flapped heavily 
against the mast, and the grab's hull shook as in terror. 
The black cloud cleared away, and slowly swept along the 
surface of the sea; then ascended and hung aloft in the 
air, concentrated in a dense mass. As 1 gazed on it, me- 
thought the pirate ship was changed, but not destroyed, 
and that her demon crew had resumed their vocation in 
the clouds. De Ruyter said, " It has been an awful and 



A YOUNGER SON. 117 

painful sight ! — but they deserved their fate. Come, set 
our gaping crew to work! Hoist the boats in, and make 
all sail on our proper course." 



CHAPTER XXX. 

This is the way physicians mend or end us, 

Secundum artem ; but although we sneer 
In health,— when ill, we call them to attend us, 

Without the least propensity to jeer. Byron. 

Two days after, one of our wounded Arabs died, and his 
companions committed him to the deep with their usual 
mystic ceremonies. His body was washed with great at- 
tention ; his head was carefully shaved and cleaned ; his 
mouth, nostrils, ears, and eyes were stuffed with cotton 
saturated in camphor, with which his body was also 
anointed; the joints of his legs and arms were broken, 
and then tightly bandaged in the mummy form ; and, 
with a twelve-pound shot fixed to his lower extremities, 
the mutilated carcass was launched into the ocean. Upon 
inquiring why they broke his joints, I was answered that 
it was to prevent his following the ship ; because, had they 
neglected to fulfil this sacred duty, his body would float en 
the waters, and his spirit pursue them for ever. 

It did not appear that the Malays had, in this instance, 
poisoned their spears ; for the men rapidly recovered from 
their wounds, except the Swedish boy, whose wound was 
of such a nature that, had not De Ruyter added to his 
other chieftain's qualifications surgical knowledge, superior 
to many of the diploma'd butchers, we should have lost 
him. De Ruyter gave up his own state- cabin to him, 
where we both attended to his wants, without a thought of 
saving ourselves trouble by permitting the doctor, for the 
sake of practice, to lop off the limb, which most of the 
faculty would have done, and of which he strongly urged 
the necessity. 

Van Scolpvelt, our surgeon, had been engaged out of a 
i 3 



118 ADVENTURES OF 

Dutch East Indiaman, where he was suigeon's-assistant, 
and grown old, hoping to see service, and be a surgeon. 
But the muddy mettle of those burghers could be stirred 
by nothing but the prospect of gain ; and their antipathy 
to powder was as great as that of Quakers, so that he be- 
came weary for want of practice, and the instruments of 
his trade grew dull and rusty. All the practice he had on 
board of her was in administering an emetocatharticus, an 
enema, or simple dejectors, to the swag-bellied Hollanders, 
after gormandising had disarranged the gastric functions,, 
His dignity — and moreover the dignity of his profession — 
which he alone revered, he thought compromised by this 
degrading application of science. He therefore gladly 
closed with De Ruyter's proposition, and had now accom- 
panied him in several voyages. 

He said, u De Ruyter is a considerate creature, and 
generally keeps me tolerably employed. He has only one 
great blemish in his character, unaccountable in a man so 
liberally-minded and humane ; and that is, in siding with 
the heathenish prejudices of his barbarous crew, and 
opposing, in all cases, amputation. On this point," ad- 
dressing himself to me, " you Englishmen are the most 
enlightened people on earth. Your government, too, with 
providential care, fearing that surgeons, like others un. 
tinctured by the love of science, may not like gratuitous 
work, give (I have been told) a premium for every limb or 
shoot pruned off from the parent trunk ; thus, from the 
multitude of the maimed, their knives don't rust, and it 
must make a very pretty addition to their salaries. Then 
not only the operator, but the operatee, is bountifully com- 
pensated, getting more by his limb off than he ever earned 
by it on. Why I" he exclaimed, with unusual energy, 
" I, Van Scolpvelt, assisted in taking off a mar/s leg in an 
English frigate, and it was the pleasantest operation I ever 
attended. It was a compound fracture : the man had fallen 
from the mast, so that the knee-bone was forced through 
the integuments into the deck. The next day the man 
recovered his faculties, and we commenced upon him. It 
would have done your heart good to see him, — I wish you 
had,, — he was a glorious subject ! No one could have 



A YOUNGER SON. 119 

witnessed the operation without astonished delight ! He 
never squeaked, or made a wry face, or spoke a word till 
it was over ; and then, turning his quid, he only asked for 
a glass of grog ; — if there had been but one bottle in the 
world, he should have had it ! — I loved him ! They are 
good people, and feel no more than the log of wood that 
carpenter is now adzing ; — no patient ought ! Now this 
boy in the cabin, — they would not speak one word to 
him, but take off his leg, and then ask him how he feels. 
Afterwards he would be sent to the hospital for life, — or 
he dies, — no more ! While I shall be three or four 
months in curing him, and he, all the time, eating and 
drinking, and doing no work. De Huyter does not think 
of this ! You are an Englishman ; go and persuade him, 
that 's a good lad ! — go and tell him I do it with very 
little pain." 

I stopped his cajoling whine with — Ci If my leg was 
hanging by a remnant of skin, and any doctor clipped it, 
I would stab him with one of his own probes I" 

He stared at me with unutterable wonder, and, putting 
the case of instruments, on which he had been descanting, 
in his pocket, he shuffled away, making a noise like a shark's 
fin flapping on the deck, which his flat feet resembled. 

As De Ruyter called him to answer some questions, I 
could not refrain from running my eye over his ex- 
traordinary figure. He had a small, dry, sapless body, 
then stripped for operating, which I could compare to 
nothing but a gigantic russet-haired caterpillar. His 
wizened face was puckered up like a withered shaddock, or 
Chinese mandarin. His pate was bald, hedged round with 
long, wiry, reddish-grey hair. The hair, that should have 
been on his eyebrows, eyelids, and beard, having entirely 
deserted its several , posts, was dotted about on his lank 
cheeks, chin, and neck, the latter of which was long as a 
heron's, and seemed covered with scorched parchment. 
Four or five irregular, yellow- crusted tusks boomed from 
his jaw, like the wild hog's; and his capacious mouth, and 
thin, fishy lips, were like a John Dory's. His eyes were 
small and sunken, with a mixture of light red, green, and 
yellow. 

i 4 



120 



ADVENTURES OF 



Yet, notwithstanding his immoderate love of practice, 
and this preposterous exterior, he was not deficient in a 
certain sort of ability, and was an enthusiast in his mystery. 
When not actively engaged, his recreation consisted in 
poring over old Dutch surgical works, chiefly manuscripts, 
or, if not, closely interlined and annotated, throughout the 
margins, by his own hand, and illuminated with disgusting 
representations of appaling operations in their horrible 
preternatural colours. His dress, on ordinary occasions, 
was composed of such stray articles as he picked up in the 
sick-ward, or plucked from the corpse of a savage. As to 
his age, it was impossible to form a guess at it ; for he 
looked like the resurrection of an Egyptian mummy, yet 
he was active, always awake (as far as we knew), and his 
faculties were unimpaired. 

He was in animated discussion with De Ruyter as they 
returned to where I stood, with his hand extended, of 
which he was somew T hat vain. It was long and narrow, 
like the claw of a bird of prey ; so utterly devoid of flesh, 
that on meeting him at night with a candle shaded between 
his palms, the light shone so clearly through them that I 
asked him to let me have the loan of the signal lanthorn he 
was carrying. But he valued his hand from its useful 
properties. <c For," as he said, <e where a ball goes, there 
I can follow it," stretching cut a long ghastly finger, adorned 
with the only ornament he wore — a huge silver-mounted, 
antique, carbuncle ring, embossed with cabalistic characters. 

I went below with the doctor to see the wounded, where 
he proceeded to business without delay, using his probe 
with the same sort of indifference as a man does a pipe- 
stopper. When he had probed, and cut, and fingered 
those who had mere flesh wounds, De Ruyter insisted on 
his looking at the scratch on my breast. He did so, and 
pointed out to the standers-by the physiology of the part, 
descanting on the action and effect of Indian poison, and 
on the subtlety with which it infuses itself by absorption 
into the whole animal economy, through the circulation of 
the blood and nervous system. " That is, to be plain/* 
said he, " having taken the outposts, having poisoned. 



A YOUNGER SOX. 121 

paralysed, and wormed its way through the husk and shell, 
it eats into the kernel. Then., beginning with the extre- 
mities, which it destroys, it gathers and concentrates its 
power, till, the venom touching the heart, the patient is 
seized with convulsions, and dies." 

Such was the tune the Dutch doctor sang in my ears, as 
he was preparing a red-hot iron, which, with the gloating- 
look of a sensualist, he applied to my breast. Whether 
this prevented the agreeable voyage of the poison through 
my system, I know not ; but it certainly converted a slight 
scratch into a spreading and ulcerated sore, which troubled 
me for a long time. 

When he came to examine, for the second time, the 
really bad wound of the boy, he revelled in his description 
of the muscles and tendons torn and wounded in the instep. 
Gangrene and mortification were the least that must ensue : 
he declared that unless amputation above the ancle took 
place, in four-and-twenty hours he might be compelled to 
remove the entire quarter up to the hip^ and yet with little 
probability of saving his life, as a patient generally expired 
under the operation. 

The poor boy cried, and petitioned first the doctor and 
then me. I called De Ruyter, who absolutely forbade the 
operation. To compensate in some measure for this, the 
surgeon, after having the boy held, set to work on him 
with as much ingenuity as an Indian when flaying a staked 
enemy ; and when the boy happily became insensible from 
the excruciating torture, the doctor looked at him, then 
round in astonishment, and said, <( Why does he groan 
and faint like a little girl ? Why, you see I merely scrape 
the bone ! " 

De Ruyter then came down into the cabin, and told him 
to bind up the wound, and poultice it. " Doctor," said 
he, ci you are like the old cook, who put live eels into a 
pasty, and knocked them over the pate with the rolling- 
pin, exclaiming, € lie down, ye wantons !' " 

When the boy came to his senses, De Ruyter gave him 
a glass of brandy, which restored him ; and afterwards 
would never allow the wound to be dressed unless he or I 






122 ADVENTURES OF 

was present ; when, in spite of the doctor's predictions, he 
did recover, though slowly. This boy is mentioned par- 
ticularly, as I shall have to narrate his melancholy fate. 



CHAPTER XXXI, 



The sky became 
Stagnate with heat, so that each cloud and blast 
Languish'd and died ; the thirsting air did claim 
All moisture. Shelley. 

Our progress was slow ; frequent calms — but, not to be 
tedious, my time was fully occupied, and we practised a 
thousand amusements. The abstemiousness and temper- 
ance of the natives rendered it a less arduous task to govern 
them than a crew, however small, of Europeans. Those 
of the latter which we had were picked up with great 
caution, all holding responsible situations in the ship, and 
were also fully occupied. De Ruyter was not only a high- 
spirited and excellent commander, but an admirable com- 
panion ; so that I had nothing to complain of. 

After leaving the Lacadive Islands, we put into one called 
Diego Rayes, for wood and water. We then passed a long 
cluster called the Brothers ; and, keeping more to the south, 
took a fresh departure from Roquepez Island. Some days 
after, between the great bank of Garagos and the St. Bran- 
don Islands, the man at the mast-head called out — "A 
strange sail to the westward !" — and then — £C Another !" 

They were in our course ; we stood on. A heavy squall 
of mist and rain coming on, we lost sight of them for some 
time. On this clearing away, the strangers were visible 
from the deck ; and the instant I saw them, I called De 
Ruyter from the cabin, being then one o'clock, p. m., telling 
him they were certainly two frigates — perhaps French 
ones, from Port St. Louis, in the Isle of France. 

€c They may be so," said he, " but I doubt it. Give 
me the glass." He looked at them attentively, and muu 



A YOUNGER SON. 123 

tered, <c Too high out of the water ; — canvass too dark ; 
hull too short ; — and the yards not square enough for 
Frenchmen. No, they are not French. Haul down the 
studding sails, and bring her up on the larboard tack, close 
to the wind." 

On doing this, the headmost stranger hauled his wind, 
and shortly after tacked too ; the sternmost held the same 
course. The wind was light, and we all kept turning to 
windward. The headmost frigate sailed remarkably well, 
and left her companion hull-down to leeward ; but yet she 
was no match for us. All we feared was the wind chang- 
ing, or losing it altogether, which we did at sunset. 

During the night we were on the alert ; no light was 
allowed, fearing they might see us ; our decks were cleared 
for action, the guns double-shotted, and the small arms 
were got up in readiness ; not in the vain hope of contend- 
ing with the frigate, but as a measure of precaution against 
any possible attempt at boarding us with boats. After the 
middle watch, a light air came out of the channel of Ga- 
ragos, and we made a long stretch to the eastward. The 
wind then varied, with intervals of calm ; the night was 
dark ; the frigates showed no lights, nor did we see any 
thing to form a guess of how they were standing. Our 
object was to get among the group of islands, the Brothers ; 
by which means we might elude their seeing us again, as 
we thought they would, in all probability, retain their posi- 
tion between us and the port, which, by the course we were 
steering when they first discovered us, we were evidently 
bound to. But the breeze had been so scanty during the 
night, that we had made but little way. The night, too, 
had been cloudy, so that our night-glasses were no of use ; 
and we began to feel anxious for the dawn of day. 

At last the sombre clouds broke in the east, changing 
their colour to purple, which speedily became fringed with 
an orange hue, and the circle of the horizon was enlarged. 
Still the frigates were not to be seen, and every face was 
brightening up with the appearance of day. De Ruyter 
stood on a gun, watching a hazy bank of misty clouds on 
our lee quarter, which were slowly evaporating, and he 
suddenly exclaimed, " There she is I" 



124 ADVENTURES OF 

I looked, and saw one of the frigates looming in the 
vapour, in which she was enveloped, like an island. She 
must soon after this have seen us, for she tacked in our 
wake, and crowded on all the light canvass she had. She 
was not more than nine or ten miles astern, and four to 
leeward of us. Her consort we saw at a great distance, 
hull-down. We turned all our attention now to trimming 
the grab, and we clapped every inch of canvass on her; 
then all the deck-lumber was turned overboard. After 
watching the frigate for some time, De Ruyter said, u By 
Heaven ! she is a crack sailer ! I think she almost holds 
her way with us ; and that is what no other vessel can do 
in these seas. She must be some new frigate, fresh from 
Europe. Besides, in this trim and rig, the grab is not 
herself. I don't like the look of the weather ; when the 
sun gets up, the breeze will die away. Get all the sweeps 
in readiness." 

Two hours after this, the water became of a glassy 
smoothness. The sun rose like a globe of fire, and looked 
terrible ; its piercing rays hardly could be endured ; they 
seared to the very brain ; and I was obliged occasionally to 
close my eyes in relief from the dazzling glitter, which 
I thought would have deprived me of sight. Yet in this 
heat the frigate ventured to hoist out her boats, at about 
ten, a.m., and give us chace. De Ruyter admired their 
hardiness. 

For the last hour we had been sweeping ; yet, from our 
size, and the disadvantage of labouring with the thermometer 
at a hundred and eight in the cabin window, we made 
little progress. We therefore made every preparation to 
meet the worst ; but De Ruyter observed, " Those 
fellows toil in vain ! At mid-day we shall have a sea- 
breeze ; then they may hoist in their boats, by which they 
will lose time." 

As he predicted, a little after noon, flaws of wind began 
lightly to ripple the glassy surface to sea- ward ; and then 
a faint current of air raised the feathered dog-vane. We 
held up the palms of our hands towards it, as in supplica- 
tion. The light cotton sails aloft first caught it ; when, 



A YOUNGER SOX. 125' 

instead of sticking, as if glued, to the spars, they swelled 
out to their arched form. 

On my telling De Ruyter that one would imagine he 
held communion with the elements, he interpreted them so 
truly, " And so I do," was his reply ; €C all my life have 
I studied them ; but life is too short to comprehend their 
mystery ! They are a hook a sailor should ever keep his 
eye on ; and it is ever unfolded before him. Those who 
do not are unfit to command, and have charge of the lives 
and properties of others." 

We saw the frigate hoist the recal signal to her boats, 
and telegraph to her companion to stand off and on, to 
intercept us if we should attempt to bear up during the 
night for the Isle of France. De Ruyter had copies both 
of the Admiralty and private signals of ships of war, as 
well as their telegraphic signals ; which did him good 
service on many occasions. 

We continued beating up to the weathermost island, 
and then the breeze gradually freshened, till we were 
compelled to take in our light canvass. The headmost 
frigate, as she continued to carry hers, rather gamed 
on us. De Ruyter grew impatient at finding that the grab 
did not distance her pursuers, as she had been wont to do. 
He said she was cramped in her movements ; and, to ease 
her, the stays and backstays were slackened ; we cut away 
the stern-boat ; got the anchors pressing on her lean-bow 
further aft ; and lightened her forwards. We then shifted 
ballast in her wings, and, to try her in different trims, he 
ordered all the men, with eighteen-pound shot in each 
hand, to come aft ; then he removed them from place 
to place; but still we could hardly hold her on. He 
remarked that her copper was foul with the accursed slime 
of Bombay. w Ay," I added, " and the frigate is a 
clipper." 

The sun sank to rest, cloudless, red, and fiery, as it had 
risen. The breeze still freshened; and having neared the 
land by eleven o'clock p.m., De Ruyter determined on 
bearing away, getting to leeward of the island, and anchor- 
ing ; which we did, trusting that the frigate would stand 
on co windward, and so lose us. Still, however, we were 



126 



ADVENTURES OF 



on the alert during the night ; or those sleeping had their 
arms in readiness : our carronades were loaded with bags 
of musquet-balls. 



CHAPTER XXXII. 

The morning watch was come ; the vessel lay 

Her course, and gently made her liquid way ; 

The cloven billow flash'd from off her prow 

In furrows form'd by that majestic plough. Byron. 

The doctor, who had as keen a scent for blood as the 
carrion-kite, after having made a platform of gratings in 
the hold for the anticipated wounded, thrust his head up 
the hatchway from time to time, to ask when the slaughter 
was likely to commence, and to solicit two of the boys as 
his assistants. At night, when we had anchored, he ven- 
tured up, trailing a bandage as long as the log-line, which 
he was adroitly rolling up. " Now, my dear fellow/' said 
he to me, " it's time I should instruct you. Just sit down 
on this gun- slide for one moment, while I show you how 
to apply a tourniquet." With these words he lugged one 
out from his waistband. 

" Nonsense, doctor, I have other things to attend to 
than to do your duty." 

iC Oh ! you are young and wilful ! Every man should 
know how to apply that; for if not done at the critical mo- 
ment, I lose my patient, and the wounded man his life.' 7 

As I was called off to attend to something aft, he went 
to De Ruyter, whom he was beseeching to be instructed 
how to apply cross and double cross bandages. He was 
answered somewhat harshly, and went below, muttering, 
" Want of sleep creates fever, fever delirium, and then 
madness ! "' 

He soon afterwards made his appearance with a small 
bottle and glass, and insisted that De Ruyter and I, 
and the whole crew, should take a glass of his water. He 



A YOUNGER SON. 127 

said it was a natural, cooling draught, would allay the heat 
of the body, and be as refreshing as sleep. De Ruyter, 
who was sorry for having spoken unkindly to him, took the 
glass; and saying it was nothing but nitric acid and soda, 
drank it. 

Van Scolpvelt, finding him so pliant, again lugged out 
some fathoms of bandage ; but De Ruyter laughed, and 
walked away. 

Then I was attacked, and, in succession, most of the 
crew ; but he could not, with all his eloquence, dispose of 
another drop of his cooling draught on deck ; so that in 
despair, and that it might not be lost, he took a bumper 
himself, and only refrained from emptying the bottle by 
remembering his actual patients below, whom he accord- 
ingly drenched. 

Wearied and jaded as I was, I looked for daylight with 
great anxiety. Older seamen, habituated to such scenes, 
lay down at their posts, and soundly slept. De Ruyter 
paced the deck with a night-glass in his hand. I bathed 
in the chains, by having buckets of water thrown over me, 
to keep my eyelids from closing, till De Ruyter entreated 
me to lie down for an hour. 

At the first glimpse of daylight we were all astonished, 
as the object which caught our sight was the frigate at 
anchor, and not three miles from us. Her lying close 
under the high land, and her hull being hid from us by 
some high rocks, projecting into the sea, together with the 
shadow of the mountain, had prevented us from seeing her 
during the night. The quick and piercing eye of De 
Ruyter was aware of her, before she had espied us ; and 
our cable was cut, and we were again under a crowd of 
sail, with the rapidity of thought. 

She soon followed us; but she had to work round the dark 
coral reef, which lay like a huge alligator ; so that we got 
a good start of her, considering there was but a very light 
air stirring. We again lightened her by throwing lumber 
and ballast overboard ; but De Ruyter, fearing we should 
be calmed, set himself to work in seriously preparing 
for battle. The sweeps were got out under the hot sun ; 
the breeze again died away ; and, at ten^ the frigate, being 



128 ADVENTURES OF 

about four miles astern, began to prepare her boats. With 
what little air there was, and with sweeping, we continued 
to drop the frigate ; which she observing, hoisted her 
boats out, and we counted seven which shoved off in 
pursuit of us. 

De Ruyter saw there were no hopes of wind till the 
evening ; and in despite of our utmost exertions at the 
sweeps, we could not prevent the frigate's boats coming up 
with us in three or four hours. His clear brow became over- 
cast with thought, and his look anxious, but without fear. 

He called me to him, and said, " You see that pre- 
cipitous rock, jutting out boldly into the sea, bleached by 
the sun and storms to a grayish white, and sapped and 
undermined into caverns. There is not a symptom of 
vegetation on it, or in its neighbourhood. It stands like 
a watch-tower, overlooking the island. You observe, by 
the colour and stillness of the water at its base, that it 
is profoundly deep on this side ; and you see a long dotted 
line, like the floats of a fishing sean, stretching round in 
the form of a half crescent ; — that is a low ridge of white 
coral, with which the sea, near this island, abounds. Now 
I want the grab to be swept round that rock ; but you 
must keep her well out, to clear the outermost point ; 
therefore place men on the extremity of our bow, and 
on the fore-yard, to look out for breakers. There we shall 
find a little sandy nook, sheltered from the trade wind that 
blows at this time of the year, which can be entered only 
in very smooth water, and by no vessel with much greater 
beam than ours. All around is so thickly studded with 
reefs and rocks, eddies and currents, that no one, im- 
perfectly acquainted with its intricacies, would venture to 
approach it, even in a calm like this. But with the slight- 
est wind stirring, or from the swell left after a breeze, all 
about is in commotion, and hazardous even for a life-boat, 
for coral cuts like steel. In a moderate gale of wind, such 
as I once witnessed in that very place, the most foolhardy 
in sea-daring would not venture within leagues of the 
shore. The heavy swell, which gets up between this 
island and the great bank of Baragos, is tremendous ; the 
mountain waves rolling in here are opposed and broken (as 



A YOUNGER SON, 129 

regular armies are sometimes by guerillas), by those count- 
less rocks, whose heads you just see peering above the 
water. Then, though impeded and broken, yet not stopped, 
the sea is white with rage, and covers half the island with 
spray and foam. On this side, there being no impediment, 
the roar and dash of the surge drown the loudest thunder. 
In the gap leading to that, — it looks no bigger than an 
albatross's nest, — ■ we will place the grab athwart, to give 
these fellows (who fight for love with more ferocity than 
others do in hate) a meeting. With our men I might in- 
deed meet them on fairer ground, without dreading the 
result ; but the days of chivalry are past ; craft and 
cunning are now called the art of war, and a commander is 
stigmatised who gives a chance, when he can avoid it. 
Besides, I now wish to spare the effusion of blood ; still I 
must defend, and will defend the grab against all odds, 
even if the frigate herself came alongside of us. The 
savage Malays have taught us that death is preferable 
to dungeons ; — if all men thought so, there would be 
none. What think you, my boy ? " 

i( I love fighting, and hate foul air." 

" But they are your " 

cc I am sorry for it. But bull-dogs, you know, will 
fight against their own kind and kin ; and I am no mon- 
grel. I '11 show my breed/' 

He smiled, and I went to cheer the men at the sweeps, 
and place the look-outs, whilst he directed the helmsman. 



CHAPTER XXXIII. 

Death doing in a turban'd masquerade, Keats' MS. 

A victory ! 
* * * * * it will pluck out all grey hairs ; 
It is the best physician for the spleen ; 
The courtliest inviter to a feast ; 
The subtilest excuser of small faults ; 
And a nice judge in the age and smack of wine. Ibid. 

At two p. m. we were sweeping round the reef, in accord- 
ance with De Ruyter's plan. The frigate lay becalmed 

K 



130 ADVENTURES OF 

under the northern extremity of the island. Her boats 
were gaining on us fast. When we were embayed amongst 
the shoals-, and closed in by the shore to the south, we lost 
sight of them all, hidden by a massy abutment of rock, 
stretching out in lonely grandeur. We furled all our sails, 
took up our position at the inner entrance leading to the 
little cove, got halsers from our bow and stern, and made 
them fast with some difficulty to the rocks. We mustered 
our men ; there were only fifty-four fit to bear arms, and 
many untried men amongst them. 

All being in readiness, an awful pause took place while 
awaiting the boats' weathering the point. Even I, fond of 
fighting and reckless as I then was, felt a queer sensation 
in this sudden transition of circumstances, finding myself 
leagued with dusky Moors in opposition to my fair-haired 
countrymen. Then, when one of the boats reappeared, 
and we heard their cheering hurrah repeated from boat to 
boat, till it died away in echoes on the hollow shore, I felt 
my heart beating impetuously against my bosom, and the 
cold drops trickling down my burning brow. There was 
a stillness in the grab I had never witnessed before ; un- 
pleasant thoughts were gathering in my brain ; but they 
instantly took flight at the full and clear tones, unem- 
barrassed look, and firm step, with which De Ruyter ad- 
vanced, saying to his men : — " Come, return them the 
Arab war-cry ! You were not wont to be so silent. And 
try if that headmost boat is in range of the guns/' 

I fired accordingly. " That gun," said he, ci is too 
much elevated. I'll try this; — here, bring a match. 
Ay, that will do/' 

The ball went in a right line, struck the water, bound- 
ing like a cricket ball, or, as it is technically termed, rico- 
chetting, and passed clean over the headmost boat. She 
lay on her oars till it passed, cheering the other boats to 
advance. I omitted to mention that, with the first shot, 
our French colours were hoisted ; each of their boats had 
the Union Jack flying. 

On their uniting, we observed them in consultation ; and 
then separating into two divisions, they advanced along the 
inside of the reef. We kf pt up a steady fire upon them ; 



A YOUNGER SON. 131 

but nothing daunted, they replied to every gun with a 
cheer, and quickened their advance upon us. <e Look, De 
Ruyter !" said I, perhaps with some degree of exultation 
at their heroic courage, — " one of their boats was struck 
with that last shot, and she is sinking ; and see, they have 
only left a boat to pick the men up, drowning every mis- 
chance with a jovial hurrah, as if they were rejoicing at a 
feast !" 

His answer was, " Prize money, promotion, and habit 
will do much. Now let's give them a volley of cannister. 
We must cripple their leaders." 

From this period I continued at my station forward ; 
most of the Europeans were under my command ; and De 
Ruyter having given me his last injunctions, went and re- 
mained aft, surrounded by his Arabs, over whom he had 
great influence. Another boat, which took the lead, was 
swamped; and, whilst they were picking up the men, though 
they opened a cross fire from swivels and muskets, their loss 
in men was obviously so appalling, that we heard them 
hailing each other. Rash as they certainly were, they 
were brought to a stand-still, and paused as if hesitating in 
what way to advance ; for as to retreat, — the word had 
fallen into disuse among men grown presumptuous with 
success. The heaviest boat, their launch, with an eighteen- 
pound carronade, and crowded with mariners, now came 
up with their barge. We heard the order — ee Give way, 
my lads ! " — and, under a steady quick fire which did 
some small damage on board of us, they dashed on with 
redoubled cheers, suffering severely from our commanding 
fire, though they were partly sheltered by some points of 
rock. They had undergone immense toil; the little air 
stirring scorched as that from the mouth of a blast-fur- 
nace ; and it was evident they had not anticipated so warm 
a reception and unequal a combat. Desperation and their 
characteristic gallantry seemed to urge them on. Five of 
their little squadron laid us alongside, while the groans of 
the dying were mingled with their comrades' loud cheers 
and sharp fire. 

We now took to our spears and small arms. Some of 
the most active, however, soon got up into our chains ; 

K 2 



132 ADVENTURES OF 

and, though frequently repulsed, renewed their endeavours 
to get on board. While we were all intent on repelling 
them on our exposed side, the barge got across the bow ; 
when a breeze and slight swell swinging the grab's bow in- 
shore, many threw themselves on our deck from the land 
side. This calling us off, small parties boarded us in other 
directions. 

I saw a Lascar, whom I had before reproved for skulk- 
ing behind the mast, attempting to shirk down the hatch- 
way. All the hatches were battened down, except the 
main one, under which the doctor was to operate. De 
Ruyter, fearing some of his Bombay sailors might run 
below, had ordered Van Scolpvelt to allow none but the 
wounded and powder-boys to go down or up ; adding, 
with a smile, " Clip the limbs off, doctor, from any cravens 
who desert their quarters ! " to which Van Scolpvelt grin- 
ned a pleased assent, and answered, " Never fear, Cap- 
tain!" Aware of the evil example of cowardice, and how 
rapidly a panic takes place, I instantly shot the Lascar, 
who fell down the hatchway on the doctor, who was lug- 
ging at his leg. 

At this moment I received a wound from a cutlass, and 
a pistol was thrust into my mouth with such force as to 
cut my lips, though, perhaps from the lock being wet, it 
did not take fire. De Ruyter swept the deck with his 
Arabs, and called out to me to look out on the starboard 
bow. Our opponents never had a shadow of chance in 
their favour, though they fought with the most foolhardy 
valour. Many of them, severely wounded, still held on 
by the rigging, and fought manfully ; and when we had 
driven them headlong into the boats or the sea, they strug- 
gled to climb up again. Our loss was great in wounded ; 
my veins seemed to run with burning lava ; I felt a 
thrilling excitement that almost made me mad ; though 
slashed and maimed in several parts of my body, I was 
totally insensible to pain ; and my men fought, generally, 
if not with the same impetuosity, with equal courage. 

Two more of the boats were lost by being stove and 
swamped alongside. Those of the enemy, who yet re- 
mained on board, were sullenly submitting, or rather had 



A YOUNGER SON. 133 

discontinued their hopeless resistance; one of them ob- 
serving, " Damn me, if I strike to a Negur, howsomever 
they sarve us ! " 

To quiet these fellows' scrupulous delicacy on that score, 
I addressed them with, — ei Come, my lads, give up your 
arms ; and you shall have what is more use to you now, — 
a piece of salt junk, and a glass of stiff grog/' 

i( Why," said one to the other, " it's all over, Tom ! 
And though he ben't rigged, yet he speaks like a Chris- 
tian." 

Those who remained forward, many of them wounded, 
came to me, and gave up their arms, 

De Ruyter told me, after the action, that as soon as Van 
Scolpvelt had learnt it was I who had inflicted summary 
justice on the Lascar, he came on deck, in the thick of the 
fight, to complain of my having, in disregard of orders, 
unjustifiably robbed him of an excellent patient, on whom 
he ardently wished to try some new instrument he had 
himself invented, which he held in his hand, and called a 
hexagonal, transverse, treble-toothed saw, rapidly revolving 
on its own axis, and cutting without pain or splinters. In 
vain he was reminded of the necessity of continuing at his 
station ; he went on complaining, that, either in contempt 
of science, or from a plot, there seemed to be a general 
combination on board, a malevolent and wicked design to 
blast, destroy, and render abortive all the fondly cherished 
hopes of his philanthropic life. De Ruyter insisting on 
not being further interrupted, he stood in mournful and 
abstracted contemplation of his horrid instrument, when a 
sailor, struck by a ball in the heart, was spinning his 
death-round near him. Van whipt hold of him, ere he 
fell, by the arms, doubled up his body in the form of a Z, 
and with miraculous strength trotted off with him, saying, 
" If I cannot have a living patient, I will essay my saw on 
a dead subject, and that forthwith !" 



k 3 



134 ADVENTURES OF 



CHAPTER XXXIV. 

Pick'd like a red stag from the fallow herd 

Of prisoners. Keats' MS. 

The fight was o'er ; the flashing through the gloom,} 

Which robes the cannon as he wings a tomb, 

Had ceased. Shelley. 

We had ordered parties to take possession of their boat 
and barge alongside, while a cutter and gig were shoving 
off with some of the officers and men, whom we had driven 
overboard. At the same time a handful of men, led on by 
an officer, seeing his boat seized, cut his way aft to get at 
De Ruyter, with whom he seemed determined to try his 
hand, or, if compelled, to surrender himself only to the 
commander, not to his dusky crew. De Ruyter saw his 
purpose, and called out to his men, who were struggling to 
oppose him, but who could hardly use their weapons on 
account of the dense crowd, (i Stand back, Arabs ! Let 
him pass ; but alone ! " 

My attention thus arrested, I looked aft, but instead, as 
I expected, of seeing him surrender his sword, he at- 
tacked De Ruyter with great impetuosity. In bulk and 
stature I thought him the most powerful man I had ever 
seen. De Ruyter seemed to think he had found his match, 
and to be glad of it ;, for his form dilated, and his piercing 
and full eye became fixed and contracted. He had a 
pistol in his left hand, and a short, slightly curved sword 
in his right. He several times ordered his men, who were 
pressing on, to hold back, or advance at their peril. The 
stranger's common ship's cutlass, made of the worst of 
metal, bent like a hoop as it struck the sword-guard of 
De Ruyter, who stood alone on the defensive. At this 
critical juncture, the cook, a Madagascar black, was in the 
act of plunging his long knife into the stranger's side. De 
Ruyter shifted his position, and pistolled the fellow ; and 
said to the stranger, — " Come, lieutenant, you have done 
every thing the bravest could, and it is too hot to be thrust- 
ing carte and tierce. You forget you are amongst old 



A YOUNGER SON. 135 

friends here. The game of fighting has been long up ; 
chance has decided for us. Come, cast away that worth- 
less weapon." 

I then went aft, and said, iC What ! Aston ! " 

He threw his sword on the deck, and gazed on me with 
wonder. As soon as he could recognise me through my 
coating of blood, powder, and sweat, " Ha ! " said he, te I 
see it all ! The well-known De Ruyter, that was De 
Witt, the plodding merchant at Bombay, — and — " 
(looking at me) " and — you V 

He looked half reproachfully as he continued, " Well, 
it is strange ! And with two such fellows, and a crew 
composed of the same stuff, what chance had we ? Then^ 
to attempt to take you in such a position as this, to sa- 
crifice the finest fellows in our ship in such a wild-goose 
venture, it was folly or madness, I know not which to call 
it!" 

Some of the frigate's men were still endeavouring to 
escape ; and two of the boats, which had, in the confusion, 
shoved off, were now attempting to retake a third boat 
from some of our men, who had possession of her, when 
a desultory fire was kept up. De Ruyter was waxing 
wrathful, and came up to Aston with a hurried step, saying, 
" Sir, I entreat you — speak to your men ! If they are 
to expect the usages of war, let them desist from useless 
efforts at further opposition. It is mere wantonness, and 
I can no longer control my people, if yours are per- 
mitted, after they have struck their flag, to attempt to re- 
gain their boats. My only wish is to spare a greater 
effusion of blood." 

Aston sprung forward, commanded the men, struggling 
in the barge, to desist, and come on board, and those on 
board to go below. <c As for those boats already shoved 
off," he said, <( they must take their chance." 

" Let them ! " replied De Ruyter, Ci I shall not impede 
their flight. 1 do not want boats or prisoners. Never- 
theless I must do my duty in keeping those I have got, 
though I am sorry to have them. It is the most un- 
profitable victory I ever gained. I have lost some of my 
best men, and the services of others that are wounded-" 
k 4 



136 



ADVENTURES OF 



" Continued success/' observed Aston, " makes us 
perhaps too confident, and this is the result." 

iC No," said De Ruyter, " it is that confidence which 
insures your success in almost all you undertake. All 
nations have had their turn : while they thought them- 
selves invulnerable, they were so ; when they began to 
doubt it, no longer were they victorious. People become 
what they believe they are. The flags of Europe are 
faded, old, and rent, successively decaying. Those stars 
and stripes" (pointing to an American flag covering the 
hatchway) ei must, — it is their station, — soar aloft ! 
But," (turning to me) " show your friend below, and 
make him welcome. There is much to be done. Yet 
what ? holla ! what is the matter ? Why, you denied 
being wounded ! " 

From toil, exhaustion, and loss of blood, I dropped so 
suddenly on the deck, as if shot, that De Ruyter could 
not catch me, though he contrived to break my fall. 

Van Scolpvelt had been some time on deck, looking over 
and summing up, with satisfaction, his rich harvest of 
patients. He viewed, with a malignant glance, an as- 
sistant surgeon, who had accompained Aston in his boat, 
and was bandaging a wound on the lieutenant's leg, having 
obtained De Ruyter's sanction to attend exclusively on his 
own wounded, which were by far the more numerous. 
These were by no means prepossessed in favour of Van 
Scolpvelt; on* the contrary, as. he was busily scanning 
amongst them for a case of amputation, in order to make 
a trial of his newly invented instrument, its horrid appear- 
ance, in such hands, made the stout hearts of these hardy 
sailors quaih I heard one of them say, " Tom, here 's an 
Indian devil of a cannibal going to cast off our head- 
matting," (that is, scalp us,) (e cut us up into junk, and 
sarve us out> like so much salt pork, to the ship's messes I" 

cs 111 be damned/' replied the other, " if old Nick 
brings his fork here to ship me into the harness cask, I'll 
sarve him out with a long spoon ! " At the same time he 
picked up one of the shot-ladles. 

The offended amputator complained of this mutinous 
conduct to De Ruyter, just before I fainted ; and then 



A YOUNGER SON. 137 

said, leaning over me, u I thought how it would be ! He 
laughed when I offered to dress the contusion on his face ; 
but he won't laugh now ! " (taking out his case of instru- 
ments.) (i Yes ! he knows better than the doctor ! I 
would sooner smoke my meershaum in the powder-ma- 
gazine than have him to cure ; for he is self-willed and 
obstinate as the she -kind are. He killed my patient, too ! 
Could he not have left the man to me ? So fond of shoot- 
ing people, this is a judgment on him ! But for him, I 
should have had the best case ! " 

During this soliloquy, which Aston repeated to me, 
they carried me into the cabin, where Scolpveit loosened 
my shawl-sash, and, on taking off my stained shirt, found 
two other wounds, one from a ball through the small 
part of my arm, the other a contusion on my side, from 
the butt end of a musket. " A judgment," he continued, 
"for the most atrocious of crimes — deceiving his surgeon! 
He would not learn how to put on a tourniquet either ; 
what foolish and irrational people the English are ! I 
don't doubt but that he would rather lose his life than 
his obstinacy. To cheat and rob his doctor of a pa-ti-e-n-t ! " 
(here he was scooping about, and shoving tow into the 
wound), " Oh, ho ! he don't like that ! I thought he 
had no feeling." 

Aston told me I was roused into motion by his ap- 
plications ; then, being called on by a dozen different 
messengers, he hastily dressed and bound up my wounds, 
and went to attend on his numerous patients. 



CHAPTER XXXV. 

In stern reproach demanded where 

Was now his grateful sense of former care ? 

Where all his hopes to see his name aspire 

And blazon Briton's thousand glories higher?' 

His feverish lips thus broke the gloomy spell. Byron. 

On recovering my senses, I found Aston stooping over 
me, sponging my face and breast with vinegar and water 



138 ADVENTURES OF 

It was some time before I understood where I was ; for 
Aston's face reminded me of my drowning frolic. " 1 have 
been dreaming/' I said ; u is that Aston ? where am 
I ? " 

e< Where I am sorry to find you. Under any flag but 
this, I could have forgiven you ! " 

This recalled my flitting remembrances together, and 
I said, ee You will allow I had cause to be disgusted with 
the former. Now I fight under De Ruyter. Show me a 
braver man, and 111 leave him ; but there is none braver 
or nobler." 

" Ay, he is well known for a gallant fellow, and I 
have found him so ; but that is not to the purpose." 

" Well, Aston, you know how I was situated; what better 
could I do ? What, in my case, would you have done ? " 

He thought a moment, and taking my hand, said 
kindly, " By Heaven, I believe the same ! " But then added, 
ec when I was at your age." 

" Ah ! if you knew him as well as I do, you might go 
farther, and say at any age. I know I would ; so let 's 
say no more about it. I want to know how things are 
going on upon deck. It seems a daik night, and we 're in 
a devilish queer place. What i is that surf breaking 
against us ? " 

" No, against the rocks. Who would have ventured in 
such an anchorage as this but De Ruyter ? I see his ob- 
ject, — to prevent our ship's getting alongside of him. It 
is wonderful! I should as soon have thought of anchoring 
on the sand-heads in a tifrbon. ,, 

" Rest satisfied ; he knows what he is at. ' Tis not 
the first time he has lain here ; he told me so. But come, 
boy, hand out the grub and grog. I must supply the loss 
of this red liquor ; I am dry as a sponge. What the devil 
has old Scolpvelt been at with my side ? I feel the print 
of his cursed talons festering in my -flesh. That fellow is 
ready made for chief torturer in hell. I wish, Aston, you 
would let your doctor overhaul me, for Van has spoiled 
my appetite." 

Aston sent for him, and said : "That doctor of yours 



A YOUNGER SON. 139 

has certainly an extraordinary look. I can 't say I like 
the cut of his jib." 

cc Not half so bad as the feel of his paws ; they burn 
like bluestone." 

Aston's surgeon now came down. As doctors never 
openly censure individuals of their tribe,, except by direct 
implication — that is, by always undoing what another 
has done — so did he. Some soothing liniment was ap- 
plied, and the accursed tow plugs were removed ; which 
gave me as much relief as drawing a splinter out of a 
wound, in which it had been long rankling. Thus eased, 
I resumed my talk with Aston, shook hands with him, 
asked him about our old ship, and why he had quitted 
her ; for I knew she was not the one which had chased 
us. 

He told me a friend of his had just come out in com- 
mand of the present frigate, and had got him appointed as 
first lieutenant. Having received intelligence of two 
French frigates, they had gone in all haste to report the 
same to the admiral at Madras ; and he had ordered them, 
and another frigate, to go and look after, and by no means 
lose sight of the Frenchmen. They had discovered them " 
lying in Fort Louis, which they had been some days 
blockading. " Besides that," said he, ec we had intelli- 
gence that De Ruyter was out in his corvette ; with or- 
ders to endeavour to cut him off in his return to port. 
Not the smallest idea had we of finding him here in the 
grab. We all mistook him for an Arab. I thought I had 
seen her somewhere, forgetting it was at Bombay. But 
then, I had not the slightest reason to suppose De Ruyter 
had any concern with her, or even De Witt ; much less 
that they were one and the same person. He has done 
more harm to the Company's trade than all the French 
men-of-war together; and his head is worth a frigate's 
ransom. It is wonderful how long he has kept clear of 
the traps set for him, clever as he is." 

De Ruyter having made his arrangements on deck, came 
down, shook Aston by the hand, and said, " This mis- 
chance of your falling into our hands will no be great evil. 



140 



ADVENTURES OP 



You can better afford it than I, What mercy should I 
have if the merchant inquisitors had me in their gripe ? 
I would rather feel the elephant's knee, when in wrath, on 
my breast." 

He then added : ec To put you as much at ease as cir- 
cumstances will allow, I have only to say that I leave the 
disposition of your men to your judgment, satisfied with 
your word of honour. How many men had you in the 
boats ?" 

sc With officers and marines, sixty or more." 

<c Well, while your ship is in the neighbourhood, your 
men may be impatient and troublesome. She will be off 
here in the morning, and you may send the doctor on 
board with the badly wounded ; they will be better at- 
tended to there, for we are lumbered up here, and alto- 
gether unprepared for such unexpected guests. I had no 
idea of any of your cruisers being off here. If you have 
any letters to write, get them ready." 

He returned on deck, Aston wrote, and I slept till the 
ensuing morning. I was then well enough, with a stick 
to scramble on deck. A look-out, whom we had placed 
on a point of rock on shore, gave us notice of the frigate's 
motions. Soon after day -break she stood in as far as she 
could with safety, to where we lay, with a top-gallant 
breeze. We sent our long boat on board her with a flag 
of truce, the wounded, under the care of the surgeon, and 
with letters from Aston. 

The captain of the frigate returned his thanks, but 
promised, notwithstanding De Ruyter's gentlemanly and 
humane conduct, to rout him out of his lurking-place. 

To this effect every expedient was used. But De Ruy- 
ter knew, by the signal made to the other frigate, that she 
was on no account to quit the blockade of Port Louis. 
She having lost her boats, could do nothing, it being im- 
possible for her to get within gunshot of the grab. Her 
only chance was in blockading him ; but on account of the 
frequent storms prevalent at that time of the year, she 
could not do that effectually ; so that De Ruyter felt little 
uneasiness. (i As to the rest," said he, " I shall sleep 
better, and eat better, with a slight excitement to help my 



A YOUNGER SON. 141 

digestion, and keep that portion of my blood which is 
Dutch, from stagnating." 

To avoid tediousness, should I have been hitherto for- 
tunate enough to shun that rock on which so many have 
wrecked themselves, I shall borrow an extract from De 
Rutyer's abrupt and succinct journal : — 

' ' Ten p. m. dark and cloudy ; lightning ; heavy show- 
ers of rain ; got under weigh ; warped out from our 
anchorage ; wind fresh from the land ; aided by the 
lightning, kept clear of the breakers ; at one a. m. made 
sail ; turned to windward of the island, which had been 
our refuge." 

This was on the third day after our action with the 
boats. We stretched over to Diego Garcia, and got out 
of the track of the frigates, having my friend Aston, and 
twenty-six of his men, on board. 



CHAPTER XXXVI. 

There's nought., no doubt, so much the spirit calms, 
As rum and true religion. Byroic, 

De Ruyter was willing to emancipate Aston, but the 
latter would not hear of it. He said he disdained to evade 
the natural and merited consequences of failure in his at- 
tempt. Had he been successful, he hoped he should have 
wished to be generous as De Ruyter; but his power would 
have been limited. Consequently, now that the reverse had 
happened, he readily submitted to the usages of war : en- 
treating De Ruyter not to hazard his own reputation, and 
the allegiance he owed to the sovereign under whose flag 
he was fighting, by stretching his power to save him from, 
he trusted, a short incarceration, however severe ; — short, 
because, as there were so many French prisoners in India, 
an exchange would readily be effected. 

<: It shall be as you think best/' said De Ruyter, "Only 



142 ADVENTURES OF 

be sure of this : I have power enough at least to promise 
you that, if the name of prisoner does not gall your pa- 
tience, you shall not feel any of its indignities. If I 
thought otherwise, you should be none, where I command. 
My allegiance is of ink, not of blood; — I owe the French- 
men none. Our compact is (as all should be, if intended to 
endure) one of mutual interest; which ceasing, either 
party would break it without an instant's hesitation. The 
scum that the French revolution has boiled up, domineers 
at the Isle of France, a Botany Bay, to which France 
transports her lawless felons. There they are frivolous, 
fickle, and violent as the monsoon gales in Port Louis, 
where the wind blows from every quarter of the compass 
between sunrise and sunset. But they dare not trifle with 
me. I say, dare not ; for, with all their trumpet- tongued 
vaunting, they are neither brave nor noble at heart. Their 
courage is but lip-deep, their rage but as a hurricane in 
petticoats. They will hate you, because you are brave, 
and have so often plucked their borrowed plumes, exhibit- 
ing them in their naked gull-like form ; or they will hate 
you, because you are taller, have a better coat, or beard, 
or button. They are envious, malicious, cruel, and das- 
tardly, as in the mowing and chattering tribe of Mada- 
gascar monkeys ; noisy and filthy as the draggletailed 
dysenteric cockatoo ; vain, conceited, libidinous, and bestial 
as the ourang-outang of Borneo." 

Aston looked in amaze, and I laughed at this tirade. 

He continued : " I tell you this, because I wish you to 
understand I am serving not them but myself. I despise 
them as a nation, though there are a few redeeming charac- 
ters among them. With all their vaunted civilisation they 
would treat you with indignity. So seldom have they an 
opportunity of heaving up their accumulated bile on an 
English prisoner, they would play all sorts of fantastic 
tricks on you. But they shall not. Let them choke with 
their own venom, ere I permit an Englishman, and my 
prisoner, to be even looked at with contempt. So now we 
understand each other. Come, my lads, let us see what 
shot remains in the locker. I am afraid our cookery and 
crockery have suffered since these rude visiters boarded us. 



A YOUNGER SON. 143 

But this cool and cloudy weather does not need the aid of 
shaddock-biters to sharpen the edge of appetite. Go 
down ; — I '11 just give a look round and follow you." 

As we went down I called out for our steward, Louis, 
telling him we were hungry as hyenas. ec Yet who the 
devil," said I, " can masticate the dry junk and rotten salt 
fish on the table ? Come, old boy, fork out something 
better than this ; or I shall be obliged to make a devil of 
Van Scolp, and grill him." 

Louis replied, u He once in, you never eat more. I ra- 
ther eat a horse's hoof." 

Scolpvelt himself then came down the ladder to look at 
my wounds. " No, no, old Van," I said, " no caustic 
plugs for me ! Sit down, and fill out some of the loose 
skin hanging about you, like a shrivelled tarpaulin." 

u What !" he exclaimed, " you must not eat ! I have 
ordered the boy to make you some congee." 

" Curse your rice-water ! Go, Louis, go up to the cook, 
and tell him to grill us a couple of fowls, with a piece of 
pork. I want something solid." 

Van would have countermanded this, had I not clapped 
my hand as a stopper on his jaw-tackle. Then pouring a 
bottle of Madeira into a slop basin, I was about to empty 
it down my throat, but he struggled hard against me, de- 
claring I should not, while his patient, commit suicide, and 
stigmatise his system. He called his boy, and told him 
to bring a bottle of his concentrated lemon juice. " Unless 
you drink congee gruel," said he, feeling my pulse, f * the 
lemon, with your febrile symptoms, is your only fluid. It 
is the fruit of the citrus, of the class, polyadelphia, order, 
icosandria. It is the chief ingredient in citric acid, valu- 
able for pharmaceutic uses on shore, and would be a thou- 
sand times of more use on ship-board, where it is never to 
be had. But I, — I, Van Scolpvelt^ have long been la- 
bouring to make it applicable by condensation e Hitherto, 
among the chemists, it has shown symptoms of decomposi- 
tion. But by the aid of a valuable old manuscript of mine, 
written by the learned Winschotan, the preceptor of the 
immortal Boerhaave, bearing date 1673, together with some 
small additions of my own, I have at last succeeded in 



1 44 ADVENTURES OF 

preserving it in the concrete form. It- is now sixteen months 
old ; and you shall see it better and fresher than when 
plucked from the tree. Here, boy, give it me !" 

As he turned to the boy, he forgot the Madeira, which 
I swallowed at a draught. He gave me one look, put the 
concrete essence in his pocket, hastened on deck, and told 
De Ruyter he washed his hands of me, that he had not 
been accustomed to attend mad people, and recommended a 
strait waistcoat. 

After supper Louis handed out a dusty-looking stone 
bottle of the right bamboo- coloured skedam. We satisfied 
ourselves it had the true zest, or, according to Louis's dainty 
observation, it had the taste and colour of flame, mellowed 
with smoke of the juniper tree. 

" Come, Louis, devil us a biscuit. You are the only 
useful man on board — no one can equal your curried devil. 
It will bring out the oily and delicious odour of the juni- 
per smoke." 

As Louis toddled on deck, Aston inquired, cc What is 
Louis ? He seems every thing here — purser, steward, 
clerk — and now you are adding cook to his other voca- 
tions." 

" He is, in fact," I answered, " a double man — Dutch 
stock crossed by a Frenchman — a nondescript fellow, born 
at the Mauritius. He unites the characteristics of the two 
nations — the portentous belly and square beam of the 
Hollander, with the wiry arms and legs of the Frenchman, 
like a hogshead of skedam on stilts. His face is a ludi- 
crous compound of both parents ; full and round as the 
pumpkin, and rubicund withal, with a Gallic nose, like a 
ripe red fig, the stalk uppermost, a mouth from ear to ear 
like the bat's, and heavy, flabby, moist lips, which, when 
gathered up in talk, display a long double row of ebonies, 
similar to the piles at the entrance of a Dutch dike or 
canal, and, like that, ever ready to receive whatever is 
offered. His natural chin is ridiculously short, but, like 
his stomach, of a prolific nature, for it has shaken three 
reefs out — a mass of fat stuck on a thorough- bred French 
neck, long, bony, and arched out in the dromedary fashion. 
His head seems formed for nothing but a golden crown, as 



A YOUNGER SON. 145 

no covering with less ballast can stay on it in a breeze of 
wind, and, indeed, he goes by the name of Louis le Grand. 
Here he comes — look at him, and say if I have exagger- 
ated." 

When the devil and grilled fowls were placed on the 
table, I bade Louis come to an anchor on the locker, and 
explain to Aston how he came to be promoted to the office 
of purser. 

fs Vy, sir, de last purser die." 

tc Come, I know that ; but how did he die ?" 

He then commenced a history in his broken English, 
showing how the late purser, in his too great love of eco- 
nomy, was about to put on the cabin- table the leather- like 
rind of a dry, over-salted, Dutch cheese ; how he, Louis, 
objected to it as uneatable ; how the other abused him for 
growing dainty and wasteful, affirming that the cheese was 
a good cheese ; how to convict Louis, whom he called an 
obstinate half-bred Dutch hog, he splintered off a ragged 
fragment, and attempted to bolt it ; how it stuck in his 
throat like the horns of a goat when swallowed whole by a 
boa ; how Scolpvelt was on shore ; and how Louis, as a 
kind friend, smacked the poor purser on his back till he 
died, and then stepped into his shoes. 



CHAPTER XXXVII. 



Few things surpass old wine, and they may preach 

Who please, the more because they preach in vain ; 

Let us have wine and women, mirth and laughter, 

Sermons and soda-water the day after. Btrcn. 

We all laughed at Louis, though there was no one on 
board that did not feel indebted to him for his good ser- 
vices. He was indefatigably industrious, and, having a 
stomach himself like a chronometer, he never missed 
the hour of serving out the rations ; besides, he was scru- 
pulously honest in weight and measure. Under the abun- 

L 



146 



ADVENTURES OF 



dant and well- organised system of this conscientious purser, 
we rarely had cause to complain ; and he used to pride 
himself on the crew's increase of power and weight since 
his appointment : the only exception, which gave him in- 
finite pain, was Van Scolpvelt, He said, Ci I believe he 
de devil ! He live on physic and smoke — he smoke all 
day and night — eat noting — sleep noting ! — he must be 
de devil or noting ! Is he not ? " 

While conversing on the admirable purveyorship of 
Louis, De Ruyter joined us, and spoke highly in his fa- 
vour. <e Nothing/' said he, " is of such importance in a 
commander as feeding his men well. Sailors are really 
very little eaters ; but if they are stinted, they are ungovern- 
able and savage as beasts of prey, which, even lions, when 
surfeited, are innoxious. Your fleet," turning to Aston, 
<£ once mutinied ; — men that never rebelled before took 
your wooden walls from you, because you stinted them in 
provisions, when the united riches of the world could not 
have seduced them from their duty. Your soldiers, too, 
break through all discipline, and cease to be soldiers, when 
deprived of their rations. With us, who only hold our 
command by the suffrages of those under us, nothing puts 
our rule in such jeopardy as when Surrounded by half- 
starved men. Hunger is deaf to reason, to fear, and to 
the iron curb of habit. The only thing requisite on board 
a ship is to prevent waste and drunkenness, — which last 
is, in its effects, akin to hunger. Come, old Louis, let us 
have another flash of the liquid lightning, for good cheer 
is as necessary as a good compass on board a ship ; and 
then, as our fellows have had hard work, go on deck, and 
splice the main brace. You have corrupted our men's or- 
thodoxy; your eloquence has overcome their scruples re- 
garding gin : — so easy is it to make converts on a point of 
faith tallying with our desires ! This Louis has persuaded 
my Mussulman crew that gin was not, and is not, forbidden 
by Mahomet ; on the contrary, he interdicted wine, in 
order that nothing but gin might be drunk in the world, 
in compliance to a miraculous vision, wherein an angel 
presented him with a stone-bottle full, brought as a sample 
from Heaven, — or Holland ! '* 



A YOUNGER SON. 147 

Louis went on deck, and presently returned to tell us 
there was a blue shark in our wake, reminding us at the 
same time that our fresh provisions were exhausted. Then, 
as he hauled a shark-hook out of the locker, he said, " I 
go catch him. He very good to eat, in de vay I cook 
him." 

At this we all turned up, and having baited the hook 
with a fowl's entrails, the greedy monster hardly let it 
touch the water, ere he darted on, turned quickly round, 
and without benison or grace, gulped the garbage, regard- 
less of the barbed iron. We soon succeeded in hauling 
him on deck ; he was a gigantic one ; and, notwithstanding 
the remains of a sailor's jacket was found within him, 
Louis instantly employed his knife, and a plentiful dish of 
cutlets was carved out of his sirloin. 

This wiled away the evening. The watch was set. 
De Ruyter went to pore over his volume of Shakspeare ; 
and I leant over the hammock nettings, ruminating on the 
past, the present, and marvelling at what was to come. 

Henceforth every thing went on pleasantly and merrily ; 
or if interrupted by untoward occurrences, such as are in- 
separable from a sea-life, where men are huddled up like 
herrings in a barrel, and will sometimes ferment, still they 
passed over as the summer clouds, leaving the sky yet 
clearer than before. Time lagged not on board the grab. 
I was associated with the two men I most admired and 
loved. I wanted but Waiter ; — and then if a deluge had 
swallowed up all the world, and the grab had been our ark, 
I should have lost nothing to weep for, so narrow and sel- 
fish were my views in this my dawn of life. Those I 
loved were all the world to me ; to all else I w T as totally 
indifferent. My affections were germinating, yet unex- 
panded. My passions and feelings were in embryo, except 
those awakened into being by Aston and De Ruyter. They 
were, in fact, alike ; though, from education and country, 
habits had so grown on them, and encrusted them, that, 
to a casual observer, no two men could seem more dissimilar. 
But at the core they were the same, they had the same 
stability of character, heroic courage, gentle and affectionate 
l 2 



148 ADVENTURES OF 

manners, and open manly bearing. They soon grew fast 
friends. 

Sailors consider the sea as their country, and all true 
bred sons of Neptune as their foster-brothers. National 
prejudices are washed and rubbed off by the elements. In 
a ship intimacies are formed in an hour, which would re- 
quire years on shore ; and what is never done on land is 
freely done at sea, when shipmates share purses, and give 
more frankly than the nearest of kin lend, — a word not 
in the vocabulary of a sailor. Sea air ripens friendship 
quicker than the hot-bed of a city. Good fellowship, sin- 
cerity, and generosity seem to have flown for refuge to the 
ocean. 

After a few days, we descried a strange sail to the west- 
ward. She bore down on us, and we, finding we outran 
her, shortened sail, till she came near enough for us to 
make her out. De Ruyter then knew her to be a French 
corvette. We hoisted a private signal, which they an- 
swered. We hove to. At sunset she came under our 
quarters ; and after some conversation with the captain, 
De Ruyter went on board, where he had a long conference. 
On his return we altered our course for the island of 
Madagascar. 

Several of our wounded died. Not having sufficient 
room for our prisoners, De Ruyter, first consulting Aston, 
and being well acquainted with the French commander, 
who was a humane and honourable man, removed them, 
under the direction of one of their own midshipmen, and 
a marine lieutenant, to the corvette, with the exception of 
Aston, and four of the men, who entreated permission to 
remain with their officer. This permission, through my 
intercession, was easily obtained. 



A YOUNGER SON. 149 



CHAPTER XXXVIII. 

Afric is all the sun's, and, as her earth, 
Her human clay is kindled ; full of power 
For good or evil ; burning from its birth, 
The Moorish blood partakes the planet's hour, 
And like the soil beneath it will bring forth. Byron. 

We then understood from De Ruyter that the corvette 
had been sent to examine into an act of piracy, committed, 
it was supposed, by the Maratti, a formidable nest of bri- 
gands, on the north point of the island of Madagascar. 
The Portuguese and French had several times attempted 
to settle there, but had always been compelled to abandon 
the place with great loss, the natives having harassed 
them unceasingly, day and night; till at last they de- 
clared the climate to be pernicious, and the settlement of 
no use, and they decamped (that is, those who could) 
with such precipitation, that they left the buildings they 
had erected, and some temporary fortifications, to be occu- 
pied by the Maratti, together with other lawless bands. 

These Maratti, an ancient horde of pirates, formerly 
dwelt on the east side of Madagascar, where they became 
a terror to the early settlers in the neighbouring islands ; 
especially by their junction with the pirates of Nossi 
Ibrahim, afterwards called St. Mary's. They cut off the 
supplies of cattle and provisions furnished by Madagascar; 
and even landed, burned, and slaughtered the inhabitants 
of the Mauritius and the island of Bourbon. The Dutch, 
then in possession of the Mauritius, were so straitened for 
provisions, and tormented by these hornets, that eventually 
they were compelled to abandon the island. Like the 
Portuguese, they too had their ready excuse, and pleaded 
locusts and rats as the cause of their abandonment ; but 
there are, as old Shy lock says, i£ land-rats and water-rats '" 
and these last were the rats who drove out the Dutch. 
They retired to the Cape of Good Hope, where they found 
the brute-like Hottentot a far less noxious animal than the 
water-rats — Pirates, I mean. 

The French settled in the island of Bourbon, close at 
l 3 



150 ADVENTURES OF 

hand, instantly took advantage of this ; and, like the 
cuckoo, took possession of the Dutchman's nest ere it grew 
cool. Port Louis was then a miserable hamlet; for the 
Dutch love mud and wood, of which, as elsewhere, their 
dwellings were exclusively composed. 

Soon after, the French, Portuguese, and Dutch com- 
panies formed an armament to exterminate the Maratti, 
who committed great havock on their trade. They attacked 
the pirates in their strongholds of Nossi Ibrahim and 
other posts, and, with immense loss on their part, de- 
stroyed a great portion of their war-canoes, and drove the 
pirates for refuge to the hills of Nossi Ibrahim, and the 
mountains of Madagascar. 

Now the Maratti, after driving off, or rather doing as 
they had been done by, — exterminating a French settle- 
ment which the company had planted in the bay of 
Antongil, had re-established themselves on the coast of Ma- 
dagascar, near Cape St. Sebastian, where they grew formid- 
able in numbers. They were encouraged by the natives, 
who found them a less nuisance than the Europeans, who 
plundered their coast, and massacred them, whenever they 
wanted a salad or a fresh egg. Here the Maratti, hardy 
and desperate, became adventurous from success, having 
defeated several attempts to suppress them ; and they were 
widely spreading the circle of devastation. By their rob* 
beries on the Indian seas, they had already depopulated 
the Comoro, Mayotta, Mohilla, and other islands in their 
vicinity, by seizing the inhabitants, and selling them to the 
European slave-merchants ; though, prior to their expul- 
sion from Nossi Ibrahim, they never could be induced to 
enter into the slave trade. So abhorrent was it to them at 
that period, that they invariably massacred the crew of 
every vessel they found carrying on this loathsome traffic, 
to which their own, as pirates, was comparatively just and 
honourable. This was the principal cause of the com- 
bination among the European merchant companies, to an- 
nihilate them, as unchristian barbarians, without light 
enough to see their own interest. At St. Sebastian (I 
suppose the patron saint of slaves), they speedily gave in- 
dications of being less heathenishly inclined; for there 



A YOUNGER SON. 151 

they entered, with true Christian zeal, into all the ramifica- 
tions of slave-dealing, and monopolised that trade in the 
East, with the same system of exclusiveness as the Dutch 
had methodised for spice, and the English for tea. They 
learned statistics, mapped the islands, counted their popu- 
lation, divided them into districts, calculated their power 
of breeding, and every spring and autumn sent out a fleet 
of proas, visiting the different islands in rotation. They 
considerately refrained from pouncing on the same island 
for three or four, or sometimes more years. The young 
and able-bodied were selected, from the age of ten to 
twenty- five, marked with a hot iron and black powder, 
and carried to St. Sebastian, where they remained till an 
occasion offered for disposing of them to the French, 
Dutch, Portuguese, or English* 

The Maratti learnt another lesson from the Europeans : 
they left no means untried to foment disunion and hatred 
among the natives of Madagascar, and enlightened them as 
to the advantage of selling their prisoners through them, 
out of which they deducted a very pretty interest, in the 
way of dustoory. As long as they restricted themselves to 
kidnapping and selling slaves, however obtained, whether 
from their own kin and kind, whether they were sons sold 
by fathers, or brothers and sisters by the first born, all 
was fair and honest traffic. But a French schooner, hav- 
ing plundered a village of sheep and poultry, and beaten 
the inhabitants, was pursued by the Maratti in their war- 
canoes, boarded, taken, and, ere the French had time to 
cut the throats of the sheep, they themselves were slaugh- 
tered, and the innocent sheep released, and restored to 
their pasture. The representatives of the grand nation at 
the Mauritius were struck with horror at this daring 
atrocity: and, if unatoned for by an ample massacre, their 
honour would be compromised. A total extermination of 
the natives of Madagascar was first contemplated. These 
ideas of severity were, however, mitigated, owing to the 
unlucky circumstance of their only disposable force, two 
frigates, being blockaded in the port by two much smaller 
English frigates, or, generally, by no more than one. At 
last a corvette arrived in the port, to windward of the 
l 4 



152 ADVENTURES OF 

island, and she was sent with ample orders, but with very 
limited means,, to execute them. This was the vessel we 
fell in with. 

The commander, a young man of engaging manners, 
the next morning came on board, rejoiced at the opportu- 
nity of getting information from De Ruyter. He used 
every argument to induce him to join the expedition ; and 
insisted on his dining on board the corvette, with Aston 
and myself, at four, by which time De Ruyter promised to 
give a final answer. 



CHAPTER XXXIX. 

How speed the outlaws ? Stand they well prepared 

Their pluncler'd wealth, and robber rock to guard ? 

Dream they of this our preparation, doom'd 

To view with fire their scorpion's nest consumed ? Byron. 

That evening De Ruyter told the French commander 
that he had only one difficulty to get over, and, if that 
could be mastered, it would please him well to keep com- 
pany with him till the blockade of Port Louis was raised. 
(C But," said he, " you must be aware that, with our force, 
we can literally do nothing ; unless, perhaps, to ascertain 
who the pirates were, wherefore they had attacked the 
French flag, and whether the schooner had given cause 
for that attack. For," he added, u I am sorry to say we 
are somewhat too hasty, overbearing, and unjust in our 
dealings with the natives of these islands. Therefore let 
us first discover who were the aggressors, and then we may 
find a time to punish them." 

The captain replied he had boarded several vessels, 
which had been recently plundered by the long war-canoes 
of St. Sebastian. 

(l I doubt little/' said De Ruyter, " of their being the 
Maratti. But you know they seldom go to sea, unless in 
the south-west monsoon ; and what can we do against 
their numbers ? " 



A fOUNGER SOX. 153 

To this the captain answered, " From every thing I 
hear they are now out ; but where, I cannot learn. We 
must first think of your despatches ; and I believe we 
shall not be long without an opportunity of sending them ; 
for I expect every day to fall in with some of our cattle- 
boats/' 

From this time we continued in company. The wea- 
ther being particularly fine, with little wind stirring, we 
passed our time very pleasantly, in giving parties alter- 
nately on board the corvette and the grab. Aston, who 
had been a prisoner in France when a midshipman, spoke 
French as perfectly as De Ruyter. At daylight we used 
to separate, and keep a look-out to windward ; and to- 
wards sunset we bore down, and remained together during 
the night. The first vessel we fell in with was a schooner, 
which, after a long chase, we made out to be an American. 
As soon as she discovered we were French, she hove to. 
She was a beautiful vessel, long, low in the water, with 
lofty raking masts, which tapered away till they were 
almost too fine to be distinguished, and the swallow- tailed 
vanes above fluttered like fire -flies. The starred flag 
waved over her taffrail. As she filled and hauled on a 
wind, to cross under our stem, with a fresh breeze to which 
she gently heeled, I thought there was nothing so beau- 
tiful as the arrowy sharpness of her bow, and the 
gradually receding fineness of her quarters. She looked 
and moved like an Arab horse on the desert, and was as 
obedient to command. There was a lightness and bird- 
like buoyancy about her, that exclusively belong to this 
class of vessels. America has the merit of having per- 
fected this nautical wonder, as far surpassing all other 
vessels in exqusiite proportion and beauty, as the gazelle 
excels all animated nature. Even to this day no other 
country has succeeded in either the building or the 
working of these vessels, in comparison with America. 

A light and fairy-looking boat, akin to the Nautilus, 
was now launched over the gunwale. It appeared a 
marvel how she could support the four herculean mariners 
that jumped into her. Two or three strokes of her long 
wooden fins brought her instantly alongside of us, and De 



154 ADVENTURES OF 

Ruyter was overjoyed at meeting with his countrymen ; 
for though his father was .Dutch, he was a naturalised 
American, and he had known no other home. He wrung 
the captain of the schooner by the hand, talked of 
nothing but Boston, his birthplace, and the port whence 
the schooner had last sailed. She had touched at St. 
Malo's, and was bound to the Mauritius. 

This was one of the fast-sailing schooners, which drove 
what was called a forced trade for drugs and spices. 
They were principally Americans, selected for their match- 
less sailing. After leaving America, they touched at some 
French port, got French papers, and sometimes had com- 
missions and lettres de marques. They were armed and 
well manned ; and all on board being allowed a portion 
of the profits on the freightage, they were interested in 
its success. The/ had a nominal French captain, a mere 
cipher, but necessary, as America was then at peace with 
England. 

This schooner had a cargo, to my mind richer than 
gold, of cognac, claret, sauterne, and a variety of European 
luxuries ; which, when she had discharged at the Mau- 
ritius, were to be exchanged for spices. She had run 
the gauntlet through the English squadron in the Bay of 
Biscay, and at the Cape of Good Hope ; and had we not 
given her information of the blockade at the Mauritius, she 
would have run another risk of being captured. De 
Ruyter advised her to put into a port to windward of the 
Mauritius, gave our despatches, and wrote some letters. 
She, in return, let us have a pipe of claret, a hogshead of 
cognac, and good store of edibles. 

The corvette now coming up, we separated from the 
American, and kept our course for St. Sebastian. Soon 
after we fell in with, and boarded some Arab trading- 
vessels. They had been plundered : the greater part of 
their cargoes and crews were taken out, leaving merely a 
few old men to work the vessels, with a little water and 
rice. This was committed by a fleet of eighteen Maratti 
proas, each having from eighteen to forty men on board. 
It appeared that this fleet was bound to some of the 
islands in the Mosambique channel. 



A YOUNGER SON. 155 

De Ruyter now conferred with the French commander; 
and his advice was that we should, in the absence of the 
greatest part of the pirates, effect a landing at St. Sebastian, 
surprise them during the night, plunder and destroy their 
fortifications, burn their town, and rescue their prisoners ; 
for doubtless they were loaded there, as they had kept 
possession of two of the largest of the Arab traders. This 
was agreed to ; and the corvette supplied us with two of 
her brass guns, and lent us fifteen of her soldiers. 

Without any thing particular happening, we got into 
1 5° 20' south latitude, ran on till we saw the high land of 
Madagascar, and kept to the north-east side of the island, 
till we had run well in-shore ; when we sent a boat, and 
brought off some fishermen, who gave us information. We 
then crept round the land, to the north, at night, De 
Ruyter piloting, being in sight of the north point of Cape 
St. Sebastian, which stretches far out to sea, in the form of 
an estuary. Taking advantage of the twilight, De Ruyter 
piloted us through a narrow channel in the recess ; and, 
before midnight, we brought to as close to the rocks as we 
could on the east side, having the cape between us and the 
town, by which means we were unobserved. 

It was a cloudy night, with frequent showers of rain. 
We got out our boats, and landed a hundred and twenty 
officers and men well armed : eighty from the corvette, 
and forty from the grab. To do the Frenchman justice, he 
felt no envy of De Ruyter's superior knowledge ; on the 
contrary, he insisted on his taking the command, and gave 
his officers orders to implicitly obey De Ruyter in every 
particular, he himself staying on board the corvette. 

On landing, De Ruyter divided the men into three 
parties, retaining to himself and the first officer the strong- 
est, consisting of fifty men, armed with muskets and 
bayonets; a French lieutenant commanded thirty-five, and 
I thirty. I had a part of De Ruyter's favourite band of 
Arabs, armed with their lances and short carbines. We 
kept on together, till we got round the cape ; then De 
Ruyter ordered me to ascend the rocks, and keep round the 
hill, nearly at the foot of which the pirates' town was 
situated, till I arrived immediately above it. The lieu- 



156 ADVENTURES OF 

tenant was directed to keep along the beach, till he was in 
a line with me ; while De Ruyter, with the main body, 
went directly forward. We were all to march as near as 
possible, and by every precaution to avoid discovery. 
When we had taken up our respective positions, we were 
to conceal ourselves till just before the dawn of day, when 
the main body would fire a rocket, which, on being 
answered by us, was to be the signal for a simultaneous 
advance and attack. We were to make what observations 
we could, under cover of the night, as to the readiest 
means of getting into the town, which was defended by 
low mud walls, having three entrance ports. On taking 
possession of these entrances, we were each to leave a party 
to keep them, who were to kill or make prisoners all who 
attempted to escape, whilst the remainder attacked those 
within. If any of us should be previously discovered, or 
if we should be attacked, we were to retreat to the main 
body. After some other instructions, De Ruyter com- 
manded us to kill none, at our peril, but those with arms 
in their hands ; and particularly to avoid doing injury to 
the women, children, and prisoners. 



CHAPTER XL. 

With a nimble savageness attacks, 

Escapes, makes fiercer onset, then anew 

Eludes death, giving death to most that dare 

Trespass within the circuit of his sword. Keats' MS. 

My party had some distance to go, and up a rugged and 
precipitous path, where we were suddenly stopped by a 
black and deep ravine, or chasm, at the bottom of which 
we heard the dashing of water. It would have been folly 
to attempt to cross here ; for a couple of men, on the other 
side, might have perhaps opposed us with success. We 
therefore went lower down the mountain ; and it was with 
great toil, and the loss of time, that we crossed to the op- 



A YOUNGER SON. 157 

posite side. My impetuosity spurred me on ; and, when 
it wanted little more than half an hour to dawn, our scouts 
in advance gave us the welcome intelligence of being near 
our destination. I now halted our party, and advanced 
with two men. We descended a narrow sheep-path, amidst 
broken and stony ground, overgrown with prickly peas, 
low shrubs, and clumps of the palm cocoa. We heard dis- 
tinctly the surf breaking on the beach, with the monotonous 
regularity of the ticking of a clock at night. The ground 
became smoother, and we discerned, close under us, the 
low huts of the town, huddled together, and looking like a 
multitude of large white ant-hills, or bee-hives. We then 
came to some ruins, on a conical hill, up which one of the 
Arabs climbed on all fours, like a jackal, and found it was 
deserted. I sent the other man back, to bring up our 
party, as this was a capital post to occupy, in case of sur- 
prise. With great caution I then descended to the wall of 
the town ; it was low, and in a crumbling state, till I came 
to two or three palm trees, where a mud hut was built on 
the wall, like a swallow's nest. Below there was an en- 
trance, or rather a hole, which evidently led to the interior. 
Having examined the place well, we hastily returned. The 
clouds gave indications of breaking in the east. The rain 
was still falling. I crept down with ten men, and ad- 
vanced under the shadow of the wall, till within pistol-shot 
of the entrance. There taking our position, we impatiently 
awaited the concerted signal from De Ruyter. 

The night was tardily withdrawing her dusky canopy, 
and the morning advanced gloomily. The hushed stillness 
was ominously broken by the whizzing noise of the rocket- 
signal, flying like a meteor over the devoted Maratti town. 
It evidently came, not as it should have done, from De 
Ruyter, but from the lieu tenant, being exactly opposite to 
my position, which showed that the lieutenant's party was 
discovered, or anticipated discovery. I replied to it ; and 
nearly at the same moment another rocket ascended from 
De Ruyter. This commanded an immediate attack ; and 
scarcely had it risen to the height of the lance I held in 
my hand, ere I had forced the trifling impediments at the 
entrance ; and, in my haste, stumbled over something on 



158 ADVENTURES OP 

the ground. The man, for such it was, essayed to rise. 
I dropped my lance, and grappled him by the throat. The 
greater part of my Arabs rushed in. I called out to force 
open the inner entrance ; which done, the faint light showed 
us four or five of the Maratti rising from the ground, com- 
mencing their war-cry. These were despatched quickly. 
The man I held scarcely needed the aid of the creese, 
which I forced through his breast into the sandy floor. 

A commotion was now raised within. We got through 
the rude out -works into the interior. The remainder of 
my men were dropping down inside the wall, which, with 
the aid of their lances, they had scaled. A noise of the 
assault on the other side was growing high ; and presently 
we heard the sharp report of fire-arms. I left a portion 
of my men to guard the entrance, and advanced, as pre- 
viously arranged, to the centre of the habitations ; the in- 
mates of which — for the surprise was complete — came 
out in twos and threes, in great confusion and terror. 
Those who crossed our path we speared ; and those seeking 
to save themselves by flight we fired at. We gave them 
not an instant to rally, till we arrived at the ruins of a con- 
siderable building in the centre, which had been erected as 
a magazine and court of guard by the Portuguese or Dutch. 
Here having taken possession, we halted. Presently the 
lieutenant, and then De Ruyter, came up ; he said, " Well 
done, my lad ! always first in danger." Then leaving an 
officer and twenty men to keep this place, we advanced in 
three parties, dividing the men equally, with strict injunc- 
tions to make all the prisoners we could, and send them in 
to this post. 

De Ruyter told me to go round to the port I had en- 
tered, as there would be an attempt to escape that way to 
the mountains ; and while he was speaking, a sharp fire 
was opened from that quarter. I hastened thither, amidst 
a scattering fire of muskets and match-locks, and the yells 
and shrieks of men, women, and children, running about 
in all directions. The war-cry of the Arabs, and the 
allons ! and vive ! of the French were so loud, that I could 
not hear either my own voice, or distinguish the report of 
my own carbine. On nearing the place at which we had 



A YOUNGER SON. 159 

entered, we saw a mingled heap of naked savages, of all 
ages, men and women, armed with creeses, guns, knives_, 
and bamboo spears ; others with their children, and many 
loaded with their goods, all rushing on. I stopped my 
men, and gave them a volley ; and as they were facing 
about, we charged them with our lances. They stood on 
their defence with the fierceness of desperation, and a few 
of our men dropped; but they resisted without method, 
impeded by their own numbers, and a panic seizing on 
them, they separated to escape. A great many were 
butchered, and no prisoners made ; for blood is like wine, 
the more we have the more we crave, till, excited to mad- 
ness, one excess leads to another ; and it is easier to per- 
suade a drunken man to desist from drinking whilst he can 
hold his glass, than a man, whose hands are reeking with 
blood, to desist from shedding more. 

My fellows rushed about in ungovernable disorder, de- 
stroying all whom they met ; and I was obliged to remain 
myself at the outlet, until I had enforced ten or twelve of 
them to keep that post. As the light grew clearer, objects 
became distinct, and I beheld the confusion and slaughter 
going on within. My senses were dizzy with the blood I 
had shed, and seen shed. The Maratti, environed in their 
own walls, essayed every outlet, sought every means to 
provide for the escape of their women and their children, 
and, finding none, they fought with the fearlessness or 
heedlessness of ensnared tigers. They ran from gate to 
gate with blind fury, and threw themselves headlong on 
the bayonets and lances. They had never heard of mercy^ 
yielding, or asking for quarter. There were no such words 
in their language. They had been accustomed to shed 
blood from their childhood, whether of men or monkies, 
with equal indifference ; and they believed all the world to 
be of the self-same nature. As for Europeans, they were 
always treated by them, if they fell into their hands, like 
fish — hanged up in the sun to dry. Old men, women, 
and children, therefore, preferred to die fighting ; and, 
thus far, we had not a single prisoner. They would have 
succeeded in forcing my position, had not De Ruyter come 
to my aid. I feel extreme pain and shame at remember- 



]60 ADVENTURES OF 

ing the horrible ferocity with which I slaughtered these 
besotted barbarians, and more at the savage and inhuman 
delight with which I did so. It would have ended in their 
total extermination, had they not effected several outlets in 
their mouldering walls. 

The only wound I received was in the leg, from a 
woman, who attempted to hamstring me as, in hurrying 
along, I stepped on her body ; and the first symptom of 
my returning reason was, on discovering her sex, instead 
of crushing her with my uplifted foot, to have her carried 
to the main guard : this was the first prisoner we had 
taken. It was then De Ruyter came to me, and said, 
ce We have had blood enough. Call our people off, and 
let the poor devils go. Seize what prisoners you can, but 
take no more lives : and lead your men to the huts on that 
sand-hill ; — there you will find their Arab and other pri- 
soners : take care they are not sacrificed in the fray ; and 
send them to the guard. Bandage your leg — you are 
bleeding fast." 



CHAPTER XLI. 

She was born at midnight in an Indian wild, 

Her mother's screams with the striped tigers 'blent, 

While the torch-bearing slaves a halloo sent 

Into the jungles ; and her palanquin 

Rested amid the desert's dreariment, 

Shook with her agony, till fair were seen 

The little Bertha's eyes ope on the stars serene. Keats' MSL 

How beautiful, if sorrow had not made 

Sorrow more beautifnl than beauty's self. Keats. 

I did so, and went, as directedj to the sand-hill. It was 
well I did, or we should not have had a prisoner to release ; 
for the women were killing them, as they lay bound hand 
and foot on the ground in heaps. These dark hags were 
despatched. Then entering a small matted tent, affixed to 
a larger one, the first object which struck me was a naked, 



A YOUNGER SON 1.6l 

gaunt Arab, bound and fastened to a short stake driven 
into the earth. He was covered with stabs, weltering in 
his own blood ; yet though bound, helpless, and dying, his 
unsubdued spirit still shone like a chieftain's. An aged, a 
decrepit she-devil was lying on his prostrate body, she 
having slipped in the gore, and with a cocoa-nut knife in 
her hand, was backing at him with feeble blows. Her 
fallen victim held fast her left hand in his teeth : and at 
his feet, huddled up in a corner, was a young girl, almost 
naked, screaming in affright, — " Oh ! father, father, let 
me get up ! " — with her bound hands stretched out, strug- 
gling to rise, but pressed down by the strong limbs of the 
man, who thus sheltered her from the fiendish old woman. I 
seized on the cloth band round the Hecate's loins, and, lifting 
her withered carcase up in the air, I dashed her down with 
such force, that she never stirred more, but lay sprawling 
like a crushed toad, the faint sparks of life being extin- 
guished without even a groan escaping her. 

This scene exhibited to my view the worst of cruelty, in 
its most diabolical shape, and filled me with horror and 
pity. I bade an Arab unbind the father, who lay motion- 
less watching me, as I proceeded to liberate his daughter. 
He seemed perfectly reckless of himself, and hesitating 
how to act, doubting my designs. In vain he endeavoured 
to sit up, for the ground was slippery with his blood. I 
saw his fears, and, to dispel them, instantly placed him in 
a sitting posture, and drew my creese from my belt, His 
eyes glared ferociously. I put the weapon into his hand, 
and said, — " We are friends, father ! — fear not !" He 
tried to speak, but the blood oozed from his mouth, and 
the words died on his lips. 

His child, now unbound, over whom I threw a mantle, 
crawled to her father's side, and kissing his incrimsoned 
hands and eyes, bent over him in speechless and inde- 
scribable anguish. The old man's desperate look relaxed ; 
his eye lost its fierceness, then became clouded and dim. I 
knelt, subdued by the scene, on the side opposite his child, 
supporting him. He, with an effort, took my hand in his ; 
I felt its clammy moisture ; he put it to his lips ; then, 
with great difficulty, he removed a ring from his finger, 



162 ADVENTURES OP 

and placed it on mine ; and, laying my hand on his child's, 
he alternately looked at us both, and convulsively squeezed 
our hands together, muttering some words. My eyes were 
wet with tears, which dropped on his bosom. His head 
and frame shook as with an ague-fit; his fingers grew 
cold as ice, his eye stony, fixed, and glazed, and his limbs 
rigid. I could no longer uphold his increasing weight. 
His spirit fled its earthly tenement. Yet still our hands 
were bound together so fixedly in his, that I could not re- 
lease them ; and he still seemed to gaze on us both with 
intense anxiety. 

Motionless as a form of marble, his child bent over him. 
She neither wept, nor even appeared to breathe. This re- 
called me to my senses. I thought she was dead too ; and 
unclenching his death-gripe, I freed myself, arose, and 
went to her. She appeared to awaken, when I tried 
gently to remove her, as from a trance, threw her arms 
round her father's neck, and clung to him with convulsive 
strength. I cleared the tent of the gazers-on, who were 
not unmoved, for they gave vent to their feelings in vows 
of vengeance ; then placing two Arabs, in whom I could 
confide, at the entrance, to let no one pass, I went into the 
open air, to recover from the faintness that was creeping 
over me. 

I slung my carbine over my shoulder, and now used all 
my efforts to stop the slaughter. A general pillage was 
going on. The grab's and the corvette's long-boats were 
attending on the beach, the vessels themselves not being 
able to get round the reef, as it was perfectly calm. These 
boats, therefore, and some canoes lying on the beach we 
commenced loading with the booty, which was consider- 
able ; gold, spices, bales of Chinese silk, the muslins of 
India, cloths and shawls from the Persian Gulf, bags of 
armlets and anklets, silver and gold ornaments, maize, 
corn, rice, salt fish, turtle, rackee, and an infinity of arms 
and apparel, besides slaves, male and female, of all ages 
and countries. Every eye glistened, and every back was 
bent with a costly burden. 

Yet so greedy and insatiable were our men, who were 
at first fastidious in their selection, that at last they re- 



A YOUNGER SON. 1 63 

garded every thing with a jealous eye, and became so gross 
in their avaricious desires, that they would fain have borne 
off garbage which the wild dog would have passed heedless 
by ; rotten fish, mouldy rice, rancid ghee, broken pots and 
pans, cast-off apparel, mats, and tents, nothing so villain- 
ously worthless or nauseous, but had some value in their 
inordinate avidity for plunder. What they could not 
carry on their backs they did in their bellies : they gorged 
themselves, like the ostrich, till they could scarcely move. 
Van Scolpvelt and the steward now appeared in the 
field, and took their ground, intent on very different ob- 
jects. Van seemed distracted with the rich variety of 
patients before him. As he hurried about the encamp- 
ment, with his shirt sleeves tucked up, his skinny arms, 
bare, bony, and hairy, a case of glittering and appalling 
instruments in one hand, and in the other a monstrous 
pair of scissors, rounded into the form of a crescent; he 
realised, in his appearance, the most damnable picture of 
an avenging demon that ever was conceived by saintly 
painter or poet. Some, not quite dead, feebly shook their 
creeses at him, others screamed with horror as he stopped 
to examine their wounds, and a few actually gave up the 
ghost as he approached. 

The steward, on the other hand, grinned from ear to 
ear, as he contemplated the huge mass of plunder, and the 
destruction of the pirates, whom he hated, because they 
had repeatedly intercepted the cattle trade to the Mau- 
ritius. But his joy was presently checked, and he said to 
me in sadness, and in worse English than I give him, 
u Oh, Captain, can you let these improvident savages waste 
so much? Look, the earth is covered with grain and 
flour as if it had snowed ! And do you see these lively 
turtles ? They are of the most delicious kind, and the 
most beautiful creatures I ever saw : what beastly savages 
to leave them here ! Make the men throw away the 
lumber they are carrying on board ; we don't want it ; do 
you ? and load the boats with these. Of what use are 
those black savages you are sending in the boats ? One 
of these" (pointing to a turtle) " is worth an island of 
them. Nobody can eat them ; can you ? Bah ! I hate 
m 2 



164 ADVENTURES OP 

savages, and doat on turtle; dont you?" We have 
enough of the one sort on board ; but where have you 
ever seen such lovely creatures as these ? I have not for 
years ; have you ? " 

Intent on this, which now solely occupied him, by 
threats and entreaties he endeavoured to induce the men 
to assist him in bearing off the turtle. At last growing 
desperate at the Arabs, who loathe them, (which Louis 
said proved they were without human palates,) he set 
about loading the slaves and women with them, the latter 
of whom he declared he never saw usefully employed be- 
fore; then turning to me, asked, in his peculiar voice, 
which began in the deep hollow tones of a muffled drum, 
and ended with the tinkling jingle of a matin bell, i( Have 
you?" 

De Ruyter now came up, accompanied by Aston, who 
had just come on shore to see the place. I told them of 
the scene I had witnessed in the slave tent, when Aston's 
gentle heart was moved, and he reproved me for having 
left the girl. My reply was, that I had done so, thinking 
it was better she should be left alone, to give vent to the 
first burst of sorrow. 



END OF THE FIRST VOLUME. 



A YOUNGER SON. l65 



VOLUME THE SECOND, 



CHAPTER I 

The Moslem daughter went with her protector, 

For she was harmless, houseless, helpless ; all 

Her friends, like the sad family of Hector, 

Had perish 'd in the field or by the wall : 

Her very place of birth was but a spectre 

Of what it had been ; there the muezzin's call 

To prayer was heard no more ! Byron. 

e€ But/' said De Ruyter, €e there is not now an instant to 
lose. We must hasten aboard; for these fellows outside 
will assuredly rally, and, aided by the Madagascarenes, as- 
sault us in our turn. So call the stragglers together. The 
prisoners are embarked, and we must embark forthwith." 

u Come, Aston/' I said, (( assist me in getting this poor 
orphan girl on board/' 

We proceeded together to the tent, where we found her 
making loud wailings. Then she would break off, and 
cry, " Father, arise, — we are free ! The strangers are 
good ; and see ! they come to free us. The old woman 
has not killed me; I am well, and she herself is dead. 
Oh ! father, get up ! — look, I have bound up your 
wounds, — you don't bleed now ! " And indeed she had 
carefully bandaged him with the only remaining rag on her 
person. 

Taking her hand, I said, " Come, dear sister ; you are 
free. We must leave these cruel Maratti." 

Without looking at me, she went on, — " See, how my 
father sleeps ! They would not let him sleep or eat, and 
he is weary and hungry." 

ee Come, dear," I said, " we must go." 

iC Go ! " she replied, " how can we ? — our father 
m 3 



166 



ADVENTURES OP 



sleeps ! — and I cannot awake him ! Oh, awake him, that 
I may feed him ! See, I have got some beautiful fruit, 
and his lips are dry. Oh, these cruel Maratti will come 
again when you are gone, and kill him ! Awake, my 
father ! His eyes are open, but he can 't move. He 
is old, and feeble from hunger ; he wants food ; his lips 
are cold with hunger ! " At this she kissed him, and rub- 
bed his head, and squeezed pomegranate juice in his 
mouth. 

" Come !" said Aston, <e they are calling you. We 
must be off. I cannot bear this sight. I 11 take her to 
the boat/' 

I entreated him to do so ; then gently loosed her hands, 
covered her with my abbah, and told her I would take 
care of her father. Aston snatched her up, and bore her 
off. Her screams were appalling. She called on the 
name of her father to save her ; and Aston shook, but not 
with his light burden. I was in little better trim. Send- 
ing some Arabs down to the beach with Aston, I returned 
to De Ruyter, who was drawing off the men with great 
difficulty. 

Louis, whose bad English I must continue to make 
better, as Aston passed him, exclaimed to me, " What is 
he carrying away ? What ! a girl ! What use is she ? 
Why, he could carry this great turtle, which else must be 
abandoned, for no one here can lift him, — can you ? 
And she might carry that little one, — it will make very 
good soup ; and is very pretty, — much more so than 
a little girl ? " 

I passed on, ordering him instantly to come on board, 
or the Maratti would soupify him. " What \" he ejacu- 
lated, u leave that turtle, worth all the rest we have 
taken ! " and he wrung his hands in anguish. 

Armed men were now appearing on the hills ; and De 
Ruyter grew furious at the tardy movements of his men. 
Many of the Frenchmen were drunk, and could not be got 
out of the tents. The shouts on the hills augmented, and 
we were obliged to move. De Ruyter went out of the 
gate, and I staid some time longer with the Arabs, to 
collect stragglers, and then followed him. I omitted to 



A YOUNGER SON. 1 67 

mention, that we had fired the town in many places, and 
burnt two Arab vessels which were grounded, with seven 
or eight canoes on the beach. 

The natives were hurrying towards the town ; and soon 
after we saw bodies of them armed, skirting along the side 
of the river we had to cross, and descending as if to attack 
us there. We hastened on, preparing our arms. When 
we arrived there, keeping as near the sea as possible, we 
heard a firing, and saw De Ruyter crossing the river. He 
left a party to keep the opposite bank, went on to the 
boats, fearing they might be attacked, and sent a mes- 
senger to me, to hasten me on. But before I could arrive 
there, being detained by the difficulty in getting on the 
drunken Frenchmen, the natives had increased till their 
numbers were formidable. They grew bold, and attacked 
the party on the opposite bank; then wading down the 
stream, and closing on our rear, they became troublesome. 
We kept our ground firmly, and I continued on the bank 
till our party had crossed. Just as I was following with 
my Arabs, I heard some shots in our rear, and now 
appeared, emerging from behind a sand-bank, a monstrous 
figure, a Patagonian, in (what I thought, as the sun shone 
on him,) bright scaled armour. It was the steward, with 
the turtle on his shoulders, accompanied by a Dutch 
soldier. I roared out to them to come on quickly, for 
every moment became more perilous. As they staggered 
towards us, I could hardly refrain from laughing. Louis, 
whom I could with difficulty make out to be a human 
figure, looked like a hippopotamus, as, reeling like a 
drunken man, he bent under the weight of the huge fish, 
which I thought he had left behind. The other fellow, 
the Dutchman, who came staggering on in his wake, was 
bulged out into preposterous proportions ; his red Guernsey 
frock and ample Dutch trowsers, secured at the wrists and 
knees, were crammed with stowage of gold and jewels, 
which he had discovered after one of the houses had been 
pulled down. He looked like a woolsack, and moved like 
a Dutch dogger, which his broad beam resembled, labouring 
in a head sea. I told them to cast their slough, if they 
valued their lives, and commenced crossing the river 
m 4 



16*8 ADVENTURES OP 

by a sand-bank, thrown up by the tide, the oniv passable 
ford. 

The natives pressed more closely on our rear ; the 
difficulty in using our arms in the water made them bold ; 
and but for our men stationed on the opposite bank, we 
should have had little chance of escape ; for they, in a 
great degree, checked their advance, and kept the space 
clear before us. Still we were compelled to hurry on. At 
this moment I heard something flounder in the water, and 
a savage yell, as of triumph, from the natives. I looked 
round, and the Dutch soldier, who was in my rear, was 
missing. Overballasted by his treasure, he lost his footing 
on the ford, and sunk in the stream, borne down by the 
weight about his body, which it was impossible for him to 
shake off. I only got a glimpse of his person, when 
my attention was called off by the steward, who either 
from fear, or from having been caught hold of by his fallen 
countryman, who was close to him, had also fallen. I ran 
back, and holding the shaft of a spear to him, he grasped it 
tight, while the huge monster he had been carrying tumbled 
into the water, and flapped his heavy fins in triumph, as 
he regained his native element. 

When Louis had recovered himself on the bank, he 
exclaimed, with a rueful look, — <c But where is my turtle ? 
Oh, don't mind me, Captain ! — save the turtle ! " 

ec Hang the turtle ! I wish he was down your throat ! " 

t( Oh ! so do I, Captain ! — that 's all I want ! Oh, 
where 's my turtle ? " As he vociferated this demand, up 
it rose to the surface, in mockery of his enemy ; and the 
instant its bright shell glistened in the sun, Louis seemed 
inclined to rush down the stream after it, bawling out, 
" There he is ! Oh, save him !" 

Thinking he meant the soldier, I looked, and inquired, 
"Where?" 

" Why, there ! " he replied, pointing to the turtle. 
" Oh, Captain, I told you how lively he was ! I cut his 
throat two hours ago ; but he won't die till sunset ; they 
never do ; and then he will be lost, — won't he ! " 

I had ordered two of my men to drag him along ; and 
so loath was he to leave the turtle, that with his eyes 




A YOUNGER SON. l6Q 

strained down the stream, he came reluctantly in a sidelong 
motion, like a crab. 

Once or twice I was compelled to turn round on our 
pursuers, and drive them off^ before we reached the other 
side. We hastened to regain our boats. Four of our men 
were slightly wounded in this retreat ; besides the loss of 
the Dutch soldier, and the deeply lamented turtle. Where- 
ever the ground was broken, or where there was a cover 
of rocks or shrubs, the Madagascarenes closed in on our 
flank and rear. I therefore retired close to the sea, and 
skirted its margin. There was one very dangerous pass ; 
it was the rough abutment of ragged rocks jutting out int6 
the sea, half a mile on the other side of which were our 
boats. The natives were ranged along the ridges in files, 
and there was already a sharp firing going on there. While 
wondering that De Ruyter should have deserted me under 
such circumstances, and hesitating as to the best mode 
of proceeding, I espied on the extreme point his swallow- 
tailed flag. We now ran on, and were hailed by our ship- 
mates ; who seeing this post was possessed by the enemy, 
had driven them up, and opened a passage for us. Yet 
every inch was obstinately disputed, and here three of our 
men were left dead ; for the natives, under cover of the 
rocks, and lying down with their long matchlocks, had 
a great advantage, while we could not get a shot at them. 
The boats approached ; and the French soldiers were 
drawn up on the beach, which being open, the natives 
dared not advance, though they kept up a scattering fire. 
We embarked amidst the wild yells of the savages, who, 
the moment we shoved off, came down like a countless flock 
of crows ; and with as much noise and din they even fol- 
lowed us into the water, and their arrows, stones, and balls 
fell about us like a hail-storm. 



170 ADVENTURES OF 



CHAPTER II. 

. Ay! at set of sun; 
The breeze will freshen when the day is done. 

***** 

The vessel lay 
Her course, and gently made her liquid way j 
The cloven billow flash 'd from off her prow 
In furrows form'd by that majestic plough ; 
The waters with their world were all before, 
Behind the South Sea's many an islet shore. Byron. 

All of us, I believe, were glad to regain our ships. We 
then towed them out, it being a dead calm ; awaited the 
land breeze at night ; and ran directly from the land, 
shaping our course for the island of Bourbon. 

On computing our loss on board the two ships, the 
killed and missing amounted to only fourteen, but we had 
twenty-eight wounded, most of them, however, slightly. 
I observed to De Ruyter, as I was entering these par- 
ticulars in the log-book, — c: It appears to me, considering 
the service we were on, and the numbers against us, this is 
a very small loss/' 

ic No, it was a very large one !" cried out Louis, who 
had just come down the ladder, €t you 11 never see so fine 
a one again. I 'd rather have lost every man and thing 
than that ; — would not you ? " 

ce What do you mean, Louis ? " 

" Mean ! — why, the turtle, to be sure. You saw it, 
Sir, and might have saved it, — could you not ? But you 
think of nothing but little girls, — my turtle was worth all 
the girls in the world ; — was it not ? " — turning, as 
he always did, at his repeated interrogations, sharp round, 
and shoving his expanded nostrils right in one's face. 

" This fellow," said de Ruyter, " is a Hindoo ; and 
believes the world is supported on the back of an enormous 
turtle/' 

" And I should not wonder," I added, " if he makes a 
voyage to the Pole, not for the benefit of navigation, but to 
extract its calliopash and calliopee. What luxury, Louis, 



A YOUNGER SON. 171 

to let your entire carcass wallow in such a sea of green fat ! 
— would it not ? " — mimicking him. 

"Yes;" he replied; "but there is no turtle there; 
nothing but walrusses, white bears, and whales." 

Van Scolpvelt now came down with some splinters of 
bone in his palm, and said, holding out his saw in the 
other hand, " See here ! I have trepanned a skull ; and 
look, what I told you is true ; feel the edges of the bone, 
they are smooth as ivory, and have a gloss, a polish on 
them, quite beautiful. I have extracted a ball, and the 
cerebrum is uninjured, the weight of a hair not having 
compressed it." He was proceeding to say the man never 
felt it, when an assistant came to tell him he was dying. 
<c That 's a lie ! " he exclaimed, and rushed on deck after 
the messenger, who was frightened at the outstretched 
instrument. As the doctor followed him up the ladder, it 
tickled him on the breech, and made him spring on the 
deck, as if a white-hot iron had been applied. 

Soon after, under the superintendence of Louis, a feast, 
that might well be termed a turtle one, was served up. A 
huge tub of soup, where a fleet of canoes might have 
almost fought a battle, the steward himself put on the 
table ; and mopping his reeky brows, said — Ci Taste that, 
and you '11 live for ever i Why, the odour itself is a feast 
for a burgomaster, or a king ! I never smelt any thing so 
beautiful ; — did you ? " 

Then came calliopash and calliopee, and stewed, and 
steaked, and minced, and balled, and grilled ; and when all 
these were cleared away, leaving us well nigh surfeited, 
quoth Louis le Grand, — u Now here are two dishes which 
I have invented, and no one has the secret of them ; though 
burgomasters and foreign ambassadors have been sent to 
me with great offers to discover it. But I never would ; 
because this secret makes me greater than all the kings in 
the world, for they cannot purchase them with a kingdom, 
nor would I give them in exchange for a kingdom ; — 
would you ? All I shall tell you is this — and it is more 
than I ever told any one before — the soft eggs, and head, 
and heart, and entrails, are all there ! — but there are 
many other things, which I shall not, must not, speak of." 



172 ADVENTURES OF 

Casting his eye on my plate, and seeing the green fat 
left, he inquired in astonishment why I did not eat it. I 
answered him, " I can't ; I don't like it." " Can't ! " he 
exclaimed — <e why, if I were dying, and had but strength 
enough to open my mouth, I would devour that divine food ! 
And not like it ! — then you are no Christian ! — is he ? 
But it is impossible, — I don't believe him ; ■ — do you ? *' 

Madagascar is one of the largest and most fertile islands 
in the world ; nearly nine hundred miles in length, and 
three hundred and fifty in its greatest breadth. There is 
a chain of glorious mountains, winding through its entire 
length, of varied height, whence many large and navigable 
rivers take their source. The interior of this vast island, 
and its inhabitants, are little known ; but those parts on 
the coast which, at that time and afterwards, I have 
frequently visited, give abundant indications that nature 
has here scattered her riches with no stinting hand. 
Nothing seems wanting but knowledge to place this mag- 
nificent island in the foremost rank of great and powerful 
empires. When I was there, the line distinguishing the 
man from the animal was hardly visible. 

The evening was singularly beautiful, the sea calm and 
clear as a mirror, and our crew sinking into rest, outworn 
by the unwonted toil of this busy day. De Ruyter was in 
the cabin ; I was keeping the watch, and Aston bore me 
company. He lay along the raised stern, and I leant over 
the taffrail, gazing on the land. The forms in the distant 
range of mountains were growing dark and indistinct. 
The transparent, glassy, and deep blue of the sea faded 
into a dusky olive, subdivided by an infinity of mazy, 
glimmering bars, as if embroidered with diamond heads, 
traced by the varied, wandering airs, and sporting like the 
lion's whelps on their mother's quiet bosom; while he, 
their mighty parent, lay hushed within his lair, the 
caverned shore, torpid from toil and devastation. Over the 
land the glowing sun hastened to his cool sea-couch ; his 
expiring rays stained the lucid sky with bright, fading 
colours, — deep ruby tints changing to purple ; then 
emerald green, barred and streaked with azure, white, and 
yellow ; and as the sun was dipping, the whole firmament 



A YOUNGER SON. 173 

was dyed in crimson, and blazed ; then left the western 
sky brighter than molten gold, till the sun's last rays were 
extinguished. When the moon came forth with her 
silvery,, gleaming light, all the gay colours faded, leaving 
a few fleecy and dappled specks, like lambs grazing on the 
hills in heaven. The change was like life in youth and 
beauty suddenly extinguished ; white and misty death, 
with his pallid win ding- sheet, enveloped all around. As 
the grab's stern swung round, and as my eye caught our 
companion, the corvette, her black hull and white wings 
alone broke the line of the moon-lit horizon, like a sea- 
sprite reposing on the boundless waters. Enwrapped in 
our contemplation of the wonderful beauty of an eastern 
night, we remained hours in silence ; and after the turmoil 
of the day, this stillness had a preternatural, or magic 
effect on the mind, more soothing than sleep. The helms- 
man, in his sleep, from habit, called out — e< Steady ! 
steady!" and even the customary forms of changing the 
watches had been neglected ; while the sentinels, un- 
conscious that their time of duty was expired, dozed on 
their posts of guard over the the prisoners ; and the balm 
of sleep medicined the wounded, and made free the captive, 
who, perhaps, dreaming of hunting on his native moun- 
tains, or fondling with his young barbarians, or their 
mother, was destined to awake, fettered and bound with 
festering manacles, chained, like a wild beast, in the worst 
of dungeons, under the sea, in a ship's hold, doomed to 
death or slavery. 



CHAPTER III. 

And we prolonged calm talk beneath the sphere 

Of the calm moon, when suddenly was blended 

"With our repose a nameless sense of.fear ; 

* * * I seem'd to hear 

Sounds gathering upwards, accents incomplete, 

And stifled .shrieks : and now, more near and near, 

A tumult and a rush of thronging feet. Shelley 

A sound, as of some one moving, caught my ear, instantly 
succeeded by a rattling noise, as of stifling, and a gurgling 



174* ADVENTURES OF 

fiowj as of water, followed. Aston and myself started up. 
He inquired, ec What is that ? " as a heavy weight tumbled 
on the deck, in the bow of the grab. Ere any one could 
answer, a dark and naked figure approached us with a 
hurried step. Instinctively I griped hold of the small 
creese I always wore in my sash. As he stopped, a few 
paces before us, I said, " Holla ! Torra, is that you ? " 
(He was a Madagascarene slave, whom De Ruyter had 
emancipated, and who had been much favoured by him and 
me.) " What do you want ? What noise was that just 
now forward ? " 

He replied, — " Only Torra kill his bad brother with 
this." And he extended his black bare arm, his hand 
clutching a broad knife, 
" Killed what?" 

He repeated, " My brother — bad brother Shrondoo." 
ee What brother? You are mad or drunk!" For 
I knew of no brother he had. 

e< No, massa. Torra no mad, and no drink." 
An alarm now took place in the forecastle ; and the 
helmsman, opening his eyes, said, " Steady ! Steady ! " 
Torra looked round, and, seeing the men coming aft, said, 
ec You no hear me now, massa. Torra say all when day 
come/' 

The men recoiled on coming near hinr, seeing his knife. 
He observed it, and told them — ec No fear Torra. No 
do bad. Torra only kill bad brother ;" — and he cast the 
weapon into the sea. " Massa, you good man. You friend 
to poor black slave ; won't let them kill Torra, now night. 
When morrow come, Torra say all. He wish to die then. 
No wish to live. Go to his father in good land ; no slave 
there ; no bad white man come buy poor black one, for 
make slave." 

Thinking him mad, I ordered him to be seized, hand- 
cuffed, and ironed. He stood motionless, only again 
saying, — 

" No kill Torra night. - Kill Torra morning. Torra 
must tell all." 

I hastened forward, asking — u What has he done ? 
Who is killed ? " And as 1 advanced, my naked feet felt 



A YOUNGER SON. 175 

something wet and slippery. Looking down I beheld a 
dark liquid stream running to the scupper holes. Something 
lay huddled up, from which it flowed, an undistinguishable 
mass, covered with a stained white cotton garment, at the 
breech of the bow-gun carriage. A man lifted it partly 
up, and said, Ci Here he is ! " The gazers-on said, 
' ' Allah ! II Allah ! " and it again fell heavily ; when, at 
the sound they all stepped back. The light of the moon, 
then unshaded, fell on the corpse of a dark naked man; its 
covering had fallen ; the head was nearly separated from 
the trunk by a frightful gash across the throat. Again I 
demanded who it was ; but none could answer. I then 
recognised it as the body of one of the prisoners lately 
captured. As life was extinct, I ordered the corpse to be 
laid on a grating, and brought aft, and a sentinel to be 
placed over the assassin. 

This horrid sight seemed to have banished sleep. The 
men stood about in disordered groups, startled at their own 
voices, which sounded low and husky ; and fellows whose 
hands and garments were still moist and dabbled from the 
morning's slaughter, stood appalled at a solitary night- 
murder. They gathered round to gaze on Torra, the 
assassin, as he sat on his heels, shadowed by the bulk-head. 
His irons jangled, and the gazers-on shrunk back ; the 
same men who, a few hours before, had assaulted un- 
hesitatingly a walled camp of desperate men, of ten times 
their number. 

Aston and De Ruyter were conferring together, when I 
observed a light air stealing along from the land. I called 
out, <c All hands trim sails ! " The crew started, and then 
I went on giving directions to shorten sail, to reef top- 
sails, and to make sail again. De Ruyter came up to me, 
and said, u Why all hands ? There is no squall that I 
can see/' 

ec Nor I either," I replied ; " but a panic seems to have 
taken possession of the whole crew ; and I want, by find- 
ing employment, to shake it off. They appeared spell- 
bound ; and if a squall had come, we should have lost our 
masts, ere they regained their faculties/' 

" Well thought of, my lad !" 



% 



^76 ADVENTURES OF 

Having turned the tide in the sailors' minds, by making 
as great a commotion as if we were in a storm, they replied 
to my orders, and moved with their wonted alacrity, 
regardless of the continued stillness of the weather. At 
any other period I should have insured to myself a thousand 
muttering, sullen curses. This done, I left De Ruyter in 
charge of the deck ; and in despite of what had taken 
place, the stiffness of my limbs, and the smarting of my 
cut leg, with shooting pains from former wounds, which 
seemed breaking out again, so heavy were my eyes that, 
while endeavouring to recall the events of the day, without 
troubling myself to unrig, I tumbled into a berth, and 
slept as soon as my head touched the pillow, as if by 
enchantment. Perhaps it was a magic pillow ; — I wish I 
had it now. 



CHAPTER IV. 

I am a guilty, miserable wretch ; 

I have said all I know, now let me die. Shelley. 

In a youthful, well-formed frame, which is health and 
strength, and wherein a good heart naturally seeks to dwell, 
for it must have room to expand, in order that its glowing 
impulses may rush through every channel, unimpeded, like 
lightning, ere it cools, — in such a frame the soul or 
spirit which governs us is strongly engendered, is born, and 
lives for ever ; but when forced and crammed into narrow, 
dark, and dreary bosoms, from want of air and room, its 
feeble flame dimly flickers in the lamp of life, till it is al- 
most or wholly extinguished. The philanthropist Owen 
of Lanark, or the sage and saintly Hannah More, and her 
tribe, scrawl and jabber about education, and of that alone 
constituting the difference between man and man, and of 
nature having sent us into the world equally disposed for 
good or evil. Shakspeare and Bacon thought otherwise ; 
and they were deep and wise, as the others are shallow and 



A YOUNGER SON. 177 

foolish. Bacon says, <c Deformed persons are commonly 
even with nature ; for as nature hath done ill by them, so 
do they by nature, being for the most part (as the Scripture 
saith,) void of natural affection ; and so they have their 
revenge of nature/' And as ill-finished, dwarfish, or mis- 
created abortions sometimes strive against their nature to 
attain goodness, so do the well-formed (for I talk not of 
beauty), in some instances, incline to evil, from choice 
against their nature. 

I have been led into this digression by the memory of 
Aston and De Ruyter, whose noble and majestic persons, 
free and graceful movements, lofty spirits, and gentle and 
loving hearts, first awakened in my nature feelings, which 
had been trampled on but not annihilated, of friendship and 
benevolence; for I had begun to think the world was peo- 
pled with demons, and that I was confined in a dark and 
dreary hell. How fondly do I dwell on those days, and 
gladly pay them this tribute, poor as it is, in return for 
such content and happiness as I experienced in their dear 
presence, when the sun seemed always shining, and the 
world one great garden of fruits and flowers ! I would not 
then have given up this world, such as it was to me, for 
paradise, such as it is painted by saintly enthusiasts, even 
though I could have gone thither, without passing through 
the dread ordeal leading to it. 

Yet mine was then a life of almost unexampled toil and 
peril, of pain from wounds, and sometimes of greater suf- 
fering from hunger and thirst. I have seen the time when 
I would have freely exchanged my blood, or given both my 
hands full of gold, for enough water to fill one of my 
palms ; when my lips have been glued together, and thirst, 
like a malignant fever, gnawed at the vitals of life. Abun- 
dance came, and my sufferings were forgotten on the in- 
stant, or only remembered to give a keener appetite, a more 
exquisite relish to things, which, grown too common by 
use, are almost considered useless, — bread and water. 
Often, with my head pillowed on a shot-locker, for iron 
served my turn then better than the softest down does now, 
covered with a tarpaulin to break the fury of the rain and 
spray, in which I was well nigh floating, plunged and 



ITS ADVENTURES OF 

tossed on what might be well called a sea-coffin, on a lee 
and dangerous shore, amidst thunder and lightning, in a 
tempest which would have torn up a cedar as easily as 
man uproots a blade of corn, — thus, and in such a scene, 
I have slept sounder than a wearied child upon its mother's 
lap, hushed with song and gentle rocking. If I could en- 
dure these hardships and privations uncomplainingly, how 
unnaturally must I have been dealt with in my earlier 
days by parents and guardians, to be so disgusted with 
life, as to seriously ponder on self-destruction ! Yet not 
only did I think on it, but, at the age of fourteen, I was 
on the point of carrying it into execution. It was then 
that I collected all the authorities, ancient and modern, 
within my reach, in its defence and justification. I am 
induced to mention this, on account of having found that 
paper a few days since. But soon after Aston, Walter, 
and then De Ruyter bound me to the world by the gentle 
chains of friendship. Thus was I rescued from a fate, 
which, but for their love, would assuredly have been mine. 
It was near noon ere I was awaked by the doctor's boy 
with a bottle of camphor and oil to apply externally, and 
a mixture to take internally. Louis was standing by, 
giving directions for serving up a second repast of turtle, 
and commenced an angry altercation with the fellow. 
" What is camphor good for," said he, " but to stuff dead 
Arabs? I hate the smell; — don't you? The doctor 
would make every man live on poison, like himself, the 
scorpions, and the centipedes. The captain wants to fill 
his body, not to rub his legs. The soup is ready ; and I 
warrant that will go down to his toe-nails, and circulate 
through his corns, if he has any. It will cure every thing ; 
— won't it ? " 

I answered, for I was hungry as a bird in a hard frost, 
<! I think it will." So the boy was chased up the ladder, 
and a repetition of turtle laid on the table. When Pe 
Ruyter and Aston came down, I inquired what had been 
done with Torra. 

" He is as you left him." 

iC Well, have you found out the mystery ? For he must 
have been governed by some strong impulse, to enact so 



A YOUNGER SON. 179 

bloody a tragedy, as he has always appeared a good and 
quiet man." 

" Yes/' observed De Ruyter ; i( but I have ever found 
these very quiet men the most dangerous, revengeful, and 
bloody. They execute, whilst brawling fellows satisfy 
themselves with talking, Did you not see him, in the 
morning's slaughter, dyed like a red Indian in blood ? " 

iC Certainly I did ; he startled me. He rushed wherever 
they were thickest, armed with nothing but two long knives. 
I began to think he had a propensity for cannibalism. But 
he is kind-hearted as bold : you remember the other day, 
when my favourite bird, the loorie, was knocked overboard, 
in a squall, by the topsail halliards ; he leaped into the sea, 
and saved him. And he was very honest ; for he was con- 
tinually down here, w T here dollars are more plentiful in the 
lockers than biscuits, and spirits than either, yet he never 
took one of the first, nor helped himself to a glass of the 
latter. Besides, Louis knows him to be the most trust- 
worthy man in the ship." 

" Oh," said Louis, iC I am sure of that ! I'd trust him 
with all the gold in the world ; for nothing can tempt him 
to steal. Only recollect when, off Ceylon, I picked up 
that pretty little turtlet, which you all contended was a log 
of wood, — but I knew he w T as a turtle. Why, I can see 
a turtle twenty miles off, when he shows no more shell 
above water than that ladle ; that is, when they sleep, for 
then they like to feel the sun on their backs, — don't you ? 
Well, do you remember how I took him up in the boat, so 
gently, without waking him, like a little child ! And then, 
when I was 5 insinuating my knife between his shell, he 
just popped out his pretty little head, looked me in the face, 
and felt my knife tickle him; and he had only time to 
draw it in again, before he felt himself in the pot on the 
fire. Oh! the black man is honest and brave ! — for he 
knocked down one of the men who wanted to put his spoon 
into that soup ! And though I left it to him to watch, he 
did n't even put his finger in to have one lick. Oh ! he is 
the most honest man in the world ! — for any body else 
would have had one lick, — would not you ? a black man, 
quite different from a white man, steals nothing, not so 
n 2 



180 ADVENTURES OF 

much as a lick at the soup. I like a black man for that ; 
— don't you ? " 

a Come," said De Ruyter, " hand out the long corks, 
and clear the decks." 

This done, Louis withdrew himself into his berth, 
where we heard him feeding like a cormorant, and bolting 
green fat, as a turkey bolts barley-meal balls. " If the 
ship were on fire," said Aston, " he would not move from 
his moorings ; he is fast. So, De Ruyter, tell us about 
Torra." 

" It is soon done," said he, " but I must first tell you 
what I knew of him previously to last night/' 



CHAPTER V. 

I do not feel as if I were a man, 

But like a fiend appointed to chastise 

The offences of some unremembered world. Shelley, 

Thou wert a weapon in the hand of God 

To a just use. Zbid 

ci Eighteen months since I put into the Island of Rodri- 
quez for wood and water; and, shooting in a jungle there, 
I sprung this fellow from a lurking-place among the rocks. 
He was one of the most wild and hungry " 

(( What !" bawled out Louis, not getting up, but thrust- 
ing his enormous head forwards, the perspiration running 
from his forehead, the turtle-fat oozing from his jaws, and 
his eyes, like a lobster's, protruding, " What ! hungry ! — 
If he 's hungry, I'll give him some of this. I can't eat it 
all, and there 's plenty on board now ; and I love him, be- 
cause he 's an honest man." 

Our laughter compelled him to withdraw, when De 
Ruyter continued : — " Having a rifle in my hand, he could 
not escape. I beckoned him towards me, and when he 
tame I questioned him. As well as I could comprehend 
him, he gave me a dreadful account of what he had suf- 



A YOUNGER SON. 181 

fered from a Dutch overseer (for he was a slave), and that 
he had been employed, with others, on the northern part 
of the island, in salting fish and catching turtle, to be sent 
to the Isle of France. He ran away just as the party 
were taking their departure, before the S. W. monsoon was 
over, for Macao ; and ever since he had lived alone in the 
woods, subsisting on eggs, fish, and fruit. Well, though 
this was an old tale, I pitied him, and took him on board ; 
since which, as you have seen, he has always behaved ex- 
tremely well." 

Louis, now surfeited, again made his appearance, re- 
commending us strongly to take a glass of skiedam, just to 
keep the turtle quiet. " For," said he, " though you 
have got him in your bellies, he'll not die till sunset, be- 
cause he was killed this morning ; for now Torra is gone, 
I have nobody able to assist me, A turtle should always 
have his throat cut at sunset, and then they die directly. 
Torra knows this ; but all the rest on board are fools, and 
know nothing, — do they ? Just let this little drop go 
down, it will turn him, he'll stay quiet till sunset, and 
you'll hear nothing more of him. That French wine is 
only good for soup, when there is no Madeira." 

As he could not persuade us that smoky Hollands was 
better than the best Bordeaux, he, to comfort himself, 
half filled a cocoa-nut shell, which he called a sail-maker's 
thimble, opened his dry dock gate, and let the water in. 

De Ruyter, who oftener encouraged than interrupted 
him, proceeded, " After you were asleep, I went to Torra. 
On my questioning him, he related his story. I'll give it, 
as well as my memory serves, in his own words." 

" Do," I said ; " but not with your usual brevity. You 
are a most unmerciful clipper down of other men's stories. 
And I wish much to know every thing about the fellow ; 
for, as Louis says, 1 like him, and shall be sorry to find I 
have been deceived in him." 

" I will be more honest," said De Ruyter, €i than most 

translators are ; for, if I don't give it literally, you shall 

have the matter unbiassed by my opinions, and free from 

the chaff of canting moral digression, either as episode^ 

n 3 



182 ADVENTURES OF 

preface, note, or annotation, all which one fool makes., 
thinking many fools will read. 

C6 ( I was born/ said Torra, ' at a fishing village, on the 
north-east part of Madagascar, in the Bay of Antongil. 
My father was a poor man, and took one wife. She had 
only one child, a boy, sickly, and not good for much. She 
would not let him work, nor would she have another child ; 
and as she grew old, she grew cross. So, you see, the 
same species of women flourish here as in Europe. In 
courtship they give us their furred paw, and we think it 
soft as velvet. We wed them j and then the contracted 
talons are unfolded, and their gentle purring is changed to 
a threatening hiss/ " 

I looked at Aston, and we smiled at De Ruyter's having 
so soon forgotten his promise at starting. He observed 
this, and said, — ' ' By Heaven ! this is only a liberal trans- 
lation, or imitation, of a simile he actually did make. Hear 
his own words : ( In youth a woman is like a green gourd ; 
her shell is soft^and pliant; but, when old, harder than 
iron-wood. My father talks not to his wife, it is of no 
use ; but like a wise man, he goes and buys another wife, 
and gets three children by her. The first wife likes not 
this,, and lets bim not bring her home. So he goes to the 
other side of the water and builds a new house. Here he 
catches more fish, and trades with the white men who 
come there. He now sees not his old wife. Her son is 
big enough to work, and he gives him a canoe, a fishing- 
net, and a spear. But he likes not work, and they are 
very poor. 

" c When I grew strong, I was a good fisherman. My 
father loves me. Sometimes I give my brother fish ; and 
when I have no fish, I give him couries. Then the white 
men,' (here Torra meant the Frenchmen from the Isle of 
France,) ' seeing the place was good, speak kindly to my 
father, and a great many come and live there. Soon after 
they quarrel with my father. They want his land, where 
he grows his bread, to build a strong place. My father 
likes not to give it ; and they kill him, and take it, and 
take my mother and my sisters, and make them slaves. 

(< e I run up to the mountains, and then I cross to Nossi 



A YOUNGER SON. 183 

Ibrahim. There they are a very brave people, and hate 
the whites. They steal on the water, not on the land, and 
make no slaves. When I tell them the white men came 
and killed my old father, who was a good friend to them, 
they all say they are glad of it, for my father was wrong to 
have white friends. But when I tell them they took my 
mother and my sisters, and made them slaves, they say that 
was very bad. Then they call a war-talk, and say they 
would speak with these white men. And then an old man 
who was a friend to my father, says, ' No ! it is not good 
to speak with them. Their words are white as morning, 
but their deeds are black as night. It is not good to speak 
with them. It is good to kill them all. 3 And after much 
more talk, they agree with the wise old man. 

" c They get many great war-canoes. They all sail 
over in the night. There was no moon, and the night was 
dark. The old man likes the black night. ' For the 
white man,' he says, e is afraid, and likes not to fight in 
the dark. A black man is the owl that sees them in the 
night ; but they the wild turkey that sees nothing. Their 
thunders strike not/ 

" c The w T hite men made a feast ; for it was the great 
day of their good spirit ; and in the poor black man's 
country they are all drunk. And when we hear they sing 
no .more, we know they sleep ; and we come down the 
hills and kill them every one. 

£C ( My friends take all they can find, and go away. I 
like not to stay there, now that my father is dead. I take 
my mother and sisters, and go to the other side, where my 
father first lived. Our father gone, my brother seems 
very sorry ; so we are all good friends, and I work for 
them all. My brother goes many times away, we know 
not whither ; and stays many days. 

c: ( Four moons after, I go to Nossi Ibrahim, to see the 
old man ; for he was a good friend, and more moons older 
than I can tell. When I come back, I go to my house, 
and find no one there, though it is night. I go to my 
brother ; and he nearly dies with grief. He tells me that, 
when I went away, the Maratti came in their war-canoes, 
took my mother and sisters, and because his old mother 
n 4 



184? ADVENTURES OF 

talked to them, and she not being good for much, they 
killed her. e Now/ he says, ' I want to make fire to 
burn her/ In grief we go, and build a pile, and the body 
is burnt. 

ci e Then my brother says to me, f It is not good to 
weep. Thy tears will not bring back the women.' 

" ' And I say, ' Why did they not take thee ? ' 

" ' Oh/ he says, e I ran up the mountain, and they saw 
me not.' 

" e I was going back to the old man at Nossi Ibrahim, 
to ask counsel. But my brother says, * No ; that people 
is few and poor, and they sell not slaves. The Maratti are 
a very great people, and they make many slaves. They 
hate each other like bad brothers. In the Maratti there 
are some good men ; let us go to them ; one of them is my 
uncle ; he will get back what you have lost, for he loves 
me ; let us go and talk with him/ " 



CHAPTER VI. 

The ghastly spectres, which were doom'd at last 

To tell as true a tale of dangers past, 

As ever the dark annals of the deep 

Disclosed for man to dread, or woman weep. Byron. 

The boat was one curved shell of hollow pearl 

Almost translucent. Shelley. 

" The conclusion," continued De Ruyter, " you may sur- 
mise. The simple fool, Torra, was kidnapped and sold by 
his crafty brother. He, being the eldest, inherited paternal 
rights over the youngest; and had, by their laws, the 
power, of which he took advantage, to sell them all. His 
old mother, having less of the devil in her, or through 
fear, opposed him ; upon which he himself killed her. 
Torra was sent in slavery to Rodriguez ; and the women 
to the Isle of France. You already know the rest of 
Torra's tragic history, and his summary code of laws. 



A YOUNGEK SON. 185 

There is no more to remark on but this : yesterday morn- 
ing, when we had landed, he swam on shore with his 
knives ; and it seems he joined your party." 

To this I replied^ " Torra indeed surprised me. When 
we were stumbling about in the dark, seeking to cross the 
ravine, it was he that led us forward to a place lower down, 
lie was afterwards of infinite use in directing us to the 
walls and the gate. Indeed I had a suspicion, from his 
extraordinary officiousness, that he intended some strata- 
gem, and therefore I kept an eye on him. But on our 
entering, when the signal was made in the morning, ail 
doubt vanished ; for the fellow was by far the most active 
of us all. Though he puzzled me then, you have now 
made me understand his feelings of revenge against the 
Maratti. While I was losing time in holding a fellow by 
the throat, to prevent his giving an alarm to those within , 
Torra had most expeditiously, as well as more effectually, 
silenced the three others — I verily believe, before they 
were awake. He then burst open the other entrance, 
which led to the interior. After which I lost sight of him, 
till I caught his figure, crimsoned from head to foot, rush- 
ing from hut to hut. Wherever he was, the air was rent 
with piercing shrieks and screams, till all was silent. I 
thought the fellow mad, .and at last fired a shot across his 
bow, for it was useless to talk to him ; and thus I stopped 
his triumphant war-yells." 

" But," said Aston, " you have told us nothing regard- 
ing his meeting with his brother." 

" Oh," said De Ruyter, " it was truly fraternal. But 
I had forgot, he is a dreamer, and has visions. Never re- 
membering my own dreams, no wonder I should forget 
friend Torra's. By Jove it is most miraculous, and de- 
serves to be recorded. Thus saith Torra : — 

ei ' In the town of the Maratti I seek, in every place, to 
find my bad brother ; but I find him not. So I feel my 
head and blood like fire. I kill all I find. I too wish to 
die, but no one fights with me. All run away from Torra, 
one man with nothing but a knife ; while they have swords, 
and darts, and guns. Iron strikes me and hurts me not ; 
guns wound not Torra. 



186 ADVENTURES OF 

u c When I come on board I am sick and hot, and lie 
down on the hammock-nettings of the forecastle, but not 
to sleep. I have too much pain to sleep. I lie down, 
looking at the sea : and then I see my old father rise up 
from the bottom, in a great fish shell, with his fishing-net 
in his hand. He looks at me, and says, c Torra, my son ! r 

ee e I try to answer, but cannot. 

"' Then he says, c Thy mother, thy sisters, where are 
they?' 

ie * 1 try to say, they are slaves to the white men. 

" e He understands me, and says, ' No, Torra, they are 
free ; look here ! thou art a slave, my son, but they are 
with me !' And I see them all three in the shell. 

c: e Then he says, e Thy brother, where is he ? ' 

* c * I try to answer, c I know not ! ' when an old and 
wrinkled white man, who lives in the dark clouds, comes 
with a long spar of fire, and says, f Where is he ? ' 

" c My father shakes his fishing-net, and again says, 
6 Where is he ? Torra, thou art a bad son, and a false 
brother to thy sisters, not to send thy bad brother to the 
evil spirit, who bids me cast my net for him ; and till I 
catch him, we are to have no rest, no peace, condemned to 
follow him ; and now I find he is in the ship with thee, 
and he alone of all my blood can sleep. Torra hath for- 
saken and forgotten the law of his father's land, blood for 
blood!' 

« < My father then throws his net again and again, and 
the white demon of the cloud shakes his spear, calling on 
the name of my brother, — Shrondoo. 

" c I turn and look the other way, and see my brother, 
as my father said, asleep. I go down on the deck ; I stand 
over him ; and when 1 am certain it is he, I kill him. And 
I look through the port on the waters, and see my father 
catch his spirit in the net, and the white demon take it on 
his spear. They all scream and clap their hands; the 
shell sinks in the sea ; and the white demon is seen no 
more ! ' 

" Such was Torra s vision — what think you of it ? I 
promise you the fellow is in earnest, for he entreats me to 



A YOUNGER SON. 187 

let him go overboard to his father ; but I think the conch- 
shell is sufficiently charged already/' 

iC Poor fellow !" said Aston, " he has been hardly used, 
and misfortune has extinguished what little intellect he 
had." 

" By Heaven ! " I exclaimed, ' c I don't know what you 
call little ; the wisest of the ancients would have lost their 
senses in such a case. As to killing his brother, if he had 
slaughtered a myriad of such fellows, he ought to be re- 
warded, not punished." 

« Very true ; but men's prejudices," observed De Ruyter, 
ec must influence the scales of justice. Our crew would 
become mutinous, if I were to pardon Torra. His brother, 
as the first-born, had his patriarchal rights, and might sell 
all his kin and kind. The command of the father, though 
but in a dream, might, on the other hand, justify Torra in 
killing him ; but, as the father is not here to give evidence, 
Torra's blood must now atone for that which he has shed." 

<e Surely," I eagerly asked, " you don't intend it?" 

" Surely I do not," was his reply ; " but we must 
make a show as if we did, and use some occasion of letting 
him escape when we get near land." 

However, this was unnecessary ; for, two days after, 
Torra going towards the bow of the vessel, handcuffed, and 
with a sentinel guarding him, looked at the sea, cried, — 
<( There he is, waiting for me ! J come, father ! " and 
sprung over the bow, and the ship passed over him. It 
was useless to make any attempt to save him, as the weight 
of his manacles dragged him down like lead. 

This poor fellow's story, and melancholy fate, made us 
all sad for some time. Aston, who had a shade of a sailor's 
faith in dreams and omens, was at some trouble, on our 
arrival at the Isle of France, to find out if that part of 
Torra's dream or vision, relating to the death of his mother 
and sisters, had actually happened. There being a go- 
vernment office, where the deaths of slaves were registered, 
he discovered it not only verified, but, on comparing our 
logbook with the register, that they had all died within 
the four- and- twenty hours in which Torra had seen them 



188 ADVENTURES OP 

on the sea ; they having been drowned in a boat as they 
were being conveyed to the Isle of Bourbon. I need not 
add that Aston's faith, after this, was not to be shaken. 



CHAPTER VII. 

Whereat a narrow Flemish glass he took, 
That since belonged to Admiral De Witt, 
Admired it with a connoisseuring look, 
And with the ripest claret crowned it j 
And, ere the lively bead could burst or flit, 
He turn'd it quickly, nimbly, upside down, 
His mouth being held conveniently fit 
To catch the treasure : " Best in all the town ! w 
He said, smack'd his moist lips, and gave a pleasant frown. 

Keats' MS. 

We were in the west trade-wind, and scudded merrily along 
in company with the corvette, having determined to run 
into Port Bourbon, in the Mauritius, on the south-east 
coast, as the English frigates were blockading the port on 
the north-west. ec Port Bourbon," said De Ruyter, " is 
the best to get into, being on the windward side, but dif- 
ficult to get out of. However, it is a beautiful harbour, 
and we shall have to lie out the north-west monsoon, which 
is on the eve of commencing. Besides, we shall then be 
nearer my home, and in quiet, as there are few ships and 
little commerce in Port Bourbon, that being carried on to 
leeward at Port Louis." 

Having been now some days at sea, I thought of visiting 
my little female captive; not that I had neglected her 
hitherto, having given her my own, comparatively, com- 
fortable cabin, and ordered the good old Rais to find out 
those of her father's tribe, or followers, on board. Besides, 
I sent him, privileged by his age and rank, to see her, talk 
to her, and assure her she should want nothing, and that 
all her wishes should be granted. He told me that three 
women, who had been with her in her father's ship, were 
already with her ; that he had collected and given them 
what articles they wanted, and that in a few days she would 



A YOUNGER SOX. 189 

be better. Indeed the old Rais, in respect of her father's 
having been, not only an Arab, but a schaich, of a tribe in 
the Persian Gulf, near his own country., had anticipated -all 
my wishes. He said, i( I must do the same for her as for 
my own child ; for we are all brothers." 

De Ruyter, who heard our conversation, as he stood by ? 
began to talk with the Rais, addressing him by the name 
of " Father ; " for so he called him, the commander of his 
Arabs, and one who had been long with him. He con- 
sulted the Rais on every point connected with his men, and 
never opposed the fulfilment of their customs. On his 
secret expeditions to the English ports, the entire com- 
mand, in appearance, devolved on the old Arab, while De 
Ruyter took the character of a merchant, Parsee, Arme- 
nian, or American — they were all the same to him, as 
occasion served. " I have been telling this youngster of 
mine, Father," said he, " that the Arab girl is now law- 
fully his wife, in the most sacred manner, according to the 
customs of your country. Is it not so ? Inform him." 

The old Rais had heard all the particulars from the men 
present at the father's death, and said, " Most assuredly, 
malik ; who can doubt it ? Yet strange it sounded in my 
ears when I was told it. It is the first time, old as I am, 
that I ever heard of an Arab schaich, whose generations 
are countless as the grains of sand on the great desert, 
giving his daughter, and mingling the blood of the ances- 
tors of the human race with one of the infidels of a country, 
so newly discovered, that our fathers knew not of it, nor 
could her father have heard of its existence ; a Yaoor I" 

" Bah ! " replied De Ruyter. " Why, the father knew 
him for an Arab, to be sure. What else ? Does he look 
like a Christian ? Has he not the Koran in his cabin ? 
Come," (addressing me,) " say your Namaz" 

<c Wise are you, malik," said the Rais ; " that is the 
truth. It is not strange her father should have so thought ; 
and I am an ignorant man if his father was not an Arab 
born, or Arab descended ; for I never saw any of your 
western people sun- dyed and featured like this boy. He 
is honest and brave, loves our people, fights with our 
weapons, and uses our customs. You see nature will break 



1.90 ADVENTURES OF 

out. Now that he has, by the blessing of Mahomet, our 
Holy Prophet, an Arab wife, I hope he will find out the 
tribe of his ancestors ; and not, like unto his foolish father, 
go from his own country, to dwell on white rocks in the 
sea." 

This was spoken so seriously, and De Ruyter, checking 
his ready laugh, conversed so learnedly on the subject, that 
I began to entertain doubts of my own identity. 

Moreover the Rais argued that the father had joined our 
hands, when under the shadow of death ; at which period, 
though distant things become indistinct, things near are 
miraculously unfolded, when connected with the secrets of 
the other world, which, to us living, are visionary as spectres 
in a dream, but, when flitting between life and death, are 
made distinct and clear. " Therefore," said he, (i her 
father could not have been deceived in that moment. Ke 
knew into whose hands he was giving his daughter, the 
hopes of his house, and the care of his children." 

" What children ? " inquired Aston ; cc has he other 
children ? " 

Already I began to think in what a predicament 1 was 
placed ; — wife, children, and Heaven knew what else ! 

" Children ! " said the Rais ; ' ' oh, yes ! but not many. 
For he was a brave and desperate warrior ; and most of 
his tribe have been cut off in wars with people like these 
Maratti, who pillaged his village, and killed them almost 
alL Now he has not more than twenty or thirty." 

£ " Enough too l n exclaimed Aston. 

i: I think quite enough," added De Ruyter, mimicking 
Louis, — iC don't you ?" 

I suppose I looked little animated at this discourse, now 
that I began to find it in earnest ; and, perhaps, as chap- 
fallen as one of Louis's lively turtle, after his throat is cut. 
However, I was a little comforted by discovering that his 
children were not of his body, they having been removed 
by the creeses of his enemies, but his tribe — as the Rais 
called all the Arabs on board his children ; sometimes, 
when he was pleased, including De Ruyter and myself. 
De Ruyter assured me, on his honour, casting jesting aside, 
that, strictly speaking, every thing the old Rais had said 



A YOUNGER SON. ]Ql 

was true as the Koran. " But then/' he added, " the 
Koran is nothing to you, and the Arab law is not yours." 

" True ; but how will it affect her ?" I inquired. 

" Only that, as her father affianced her to you, she can 
marry no one else. From duty, therefore, as well as hu- 
manity, you must provide for her, and convey her, with 
her Arabs, to her own country. I know you have feeling 
as well as honour, and that, whatever course you are 
destined to steer, they will never quit the helm. I never 
have, nor ever will, my dear boy, thrust officious counsel 
down your throat, which, like iron, is only to be digested 
by the power of an ostrich's stomach. Besides, you are 
not one of those who arrogate exclusively to themselves, 
their sect, or country, (as too many of your countrymen 
do,) all the good and virtue under the sun. The light is 
not less bright, because unobscured by what is falsely 
called civilisation, on the sands of these wild children of 
the desert. Though they are not warmed and cooled by 
the same summer and winter, as old Shylock says, as Jews 
and Christians are, yet if you prick them, they bleed, — 
and so forth. You understand me. So, come down, and 
having discussed this, let us discuss a cup of claret ; the 
making of which, and of barbers, dancers, fiddlers^ cooks, 
pimps, and courtesans, are the only real benefits France 
has conferred on the world, as Voltaire has fully proved in 
his f Lettre aux Welches/ If any Frenchman expects to 
go to heaven, it must be by virtue of one of these pleas 
alone." 

Aston afterwards inquired of me what I intended doing 
in this affair. (C Doing ! " I replied ; " why, did you not 
hear ? — it is all ready done, man." 

"What done?" 

(i Why, I am married, — -without banns, or babbling 
about the business. It is but like the first shock in bathing; 
the timid suffer most by creeping in by degrees ; the bold, 
by plunging in head foremost, hardly feel it. I am no 
stickler. If I must go in, give me deep water, and a height 
to leap from ; — then I shall neither cut my foot, nor feel 
the shock." 



192 ADVENTURES OF 

ce But consider, my lad, she is but a baby ; and you 
have scarcely seen her." 

ci Well, what Arab does till after he is married ? ** 

" How can you take her home ? You don't intend 
passing all your life with Arabs ?" 

« Why not ? I have no home. Old father Rais says 
this is my country ; and I like it very well, — I like the 
sun better than snow. Aston ! don't be puckering up your 
face, like a libidinous parson in the pulpit, exhorting his 
parishioners against the sin of the flesh and the devil. 
Come, shake those wrinkles out with claret. Have you not 
heard this is my wedding-day ? Let us spend it in re- 
joicings ! I hate preaching, and like wine." 

So with callians, sheroots, and claret we passed the 
time; De Ruyter and Aston bantering me about my novel 
marriage. My spirits were too good to be dashed by such 
a trifle, as I then thought marriage. When Louis heard 
of it, he said, ce I had a frow too once ; but she was never 
good for much. When I went to sea, she drank all my 
gin. I never could keep a drop of good skiedam in the 
house. I did not like that ; — would you ? She grew 
very big, and every one said she was with child ; but I 
knew, if she had any thing, it must be young kegs of Hol- 
lands. Afterwards the doctors thought the same ; for they 
— what they call — tapped her many times. But she loved 
the liquor too much to let it out, — they got nothing but 
water. This I could not have believed — would you ? 
For I never saw her touch water in my life ; she could not 
abide the sight of it, and said it gave her a cold in the 
stomach. So I left her, and went to sea, — I knew she'd 
not follow me on the water ; and she was sad, and sick, 
and melancholy, from grief, poor woman ! — because she 
got no more gin. I took all with me." 



A YOUNGER SON. 1Q3 



CHAPTER VIII. 

For your gaping gulf and your gullet wide, 

The ravine is ready on every side 3 

Their boiled meat, and roast meat, and meat from the coal. 

You may chop it, and tear it, and mash it. Shelley. 

Van Scolpvelt then came down, with the list of sick and 
wounded. His hands were so full of business, that we 
seldom saw him, — except his head, which he occasionally 
shoved up the hatchway for air, as a grampus does his 
above the water. He expounded to us the law regarding 
murderers, whose bodies, in all civilised countries, were 
given for dissection ; therefore, he continued, by bene- 
fiting science, they did a great deal more good than evil in 
the world, and that it was a pity so few murders were 
committed. Then he accused us of a conspiracy to para- 
lyse the efforts of scientific men, not only by opposing 
amputation, but by conniving at a felonious fraud in de- 
priving him of a post-mortem dissection. ce Had you 
acted," said he, (( in a summary manner, which you do 
on other occasions, with Torra, — who was a very fine 
subject, — you would have hanged him instantly, and given 
me his body. I thought he was an honest man ; but find 
him, like every one else, conspiring to cheat the doctor, — 
which he has done by throwing himself away to the fishes, 
when he was my lawful perquisite/' 

With a glass out of Louis's bottle, he returned to his 
patients. "Ah!" said Louis, "if I did not see him 
drink this now and then, and smoke his pipe, Id not be- 
lieve him a live man. But any man may live on this/' 
— (holding up the bottle), — " could not you ? For it 
is like oil and spirit at once ; the one keeps the body, the 
other the soul ; — don't they ? " 

" Yes, with the addition of a turtle, now and then, I 
think I might. Do you think, Louis, they have turtle in 
heaven ? " 

" I am positive they have," was his reply ; " or who 




19^ ADVENTURES OF 

would wish to go there ? — would you ? It is no paradise 
without turtle ; — is it ? Then there is plenty of water 
in the moon, or where does the rain come from? — so 
there must he gin there as well, to keep the damp out." 

I went on deck to keep the first watch. From Louis 
and turtle my thoughts reverted to my own little turtle- 
dove in her cage. Then, only looking at the sunny side 
of things, all was bright. I seemed to expand in bulk 
and stature. My thoughts ran nearly in the same channel 
with those of Alnaschar, the prattling barber's brother, the 
fabled glass-merchant, of imaginative renown ; for, like 
him, my fancy ran wild. I determined to be, at first, a 
kind and loving husband, then austere and severe, or kind 
and cruel by turns. Certainly, though I thought of every 
thing the most preposterous, not a single ray of light, use. 
ful or rational, shone on my midnight reveries. The 
gong sounded twelve ; I was relieved from duty. The 
cares of married life not once disturbed my sleep. I 
wonder now I slept so soundly. 

At last I was awakened by Van's shaking my leg, I 
sprung up in an instant, stamping it on the ground, in fear 
that he had been operating on it in my sleep. " What 's 
the matter, Van ? " 

" What are you talking about ? One of the prisoners, 
an Arab, is dying. He wants to see you." 

I dashed my head into a bucket of salt water, and fol- 
lowed the doctor. Notwithstanding I met Louis in the 
way, with a hot turtle-steak, which he urged me to eat 
first, as it was hazardous to go into the sick berth with an 
empty stomach, down I went : the man, who was badly 
wounded, only wanted to tell me to be kind to his father's 
child ; to let him see her before he died, in order that he 
might take any message to her father, with whom he 
should soon be again, for he saw the blue angel of death 
hovering over him, in haste to spring aloft ; to urge me to 
be a father to his two wives and five children, and to tell 
them they must, Ishallah ! (please God !) continue their 
war for ever with the Maratti, because, whilst one re- 
mained alive, their father's spirit would be kept out of the 
heavens ; and lastly; to see him put into the sea with all 



A YOUNGER SOX. 195 

the customary rites of his country, net allowing that white 
Indian with his long knife, pointing to Van Seoipvelt, .to 
scalp him, or cut him. " For/' said he, " if he cut any 
thing away from me here to eat it, I am no more fit for a 
warrior in the other land/' 

Van gathered up his visage into a compound of horror^ 
astonishment, and ferocity, and growled and snarled like a 
hyena. I believe the fear of Van Seoipvelt hastened the 
Arab's spirit, which, by the glassiness of his eye, was 
already on the wing ; for it took flight, w r hile I was endea- 
vouring to appease the doctor's wrath. 

I bade his Arab comrades take charge of the body. 
They erected a canvass berth, placed it within, and re- 
peated the same ceremonies I have before narrated — only 
that now I was obliged to be an actor in their mys- 
teries. 

Here was I transformed, as by magic, from a friend- 
less, outcast, reckless boy of the West, without tie or home, 
into sea Schaich, Arab, Mussulman — married ! To give 
some idea of how much these transitions (at least the last, 
which governed the rest) weighed on my mind, I should 
not have known my wife from any other girl or woman. 
I had been so occupied with the father, and her head and 
face having been, for the most part, veiled, that I had not 
seen, or observed her features. I had not even yet in- 
quired her name. It is true I had a Koran ; but I knew 
not where was my adopted country. 

The first step I took was, I then thought, and think 
still, the right one — to obtain information regarding the 
lady. I therefore ascertained, to begin in a business-like 
way, that her name was Zela. That, engraved on my 
memory then in faint characters, will be found deeply, 
indelibly impressed on my heart w T hen I die. Should any 
curious Van Seoipvelt desire to pry into my body, I freely 
give him leave, but more readily to Van himself, should 
he then live, to show him that I have not that unmeasured 
hatred of science, with which he has so often taxed me. 
He shall find, annexed to my last testament, a codicil, in 
which I have expressly set down that my body shall be 
sent to Amsterdam (where he was when I last heard ef 
o 2 



196 ADVENTURES OF 

him); conserved in a hogshead of right skedam — the body 
for the scientific Van Scolpvelt, the fluid for honest Louis's 
frow, if recovered from her dropsy. 

After I had breakfasted, and fulfilled the injunctions of 
the dying Arab, by witnessing the consignment of his body 
to the deep, my thoughts again veered round to the right 
point of the compass — my virgin bride. I was schooled 
into the proper guttural ..pronunciation of her name ; no 
easy task, for I was compelled to repeat the Z a hundred 
times, ere the old duenna who tutored me was satisfied 
with its hissing aspiration. Then she proceeded to im- 
press on my memory ten thousand ceremonies and cautions 
to be used ; I was not to touch the lady's veil, or person, 
or garments, or talk too much, or ask questions, or stay 
too long. For the lady Zela's thoughts were communing 
with her father's spirit ; all her love was dead with him ; 
her eyes, which outshone the stars when she was happy, 
were now lustreless as her dead father's ; her face, fairer 
than the moon, was now darkened by the clouds of grief ; 
her lips, redder than henna, were pale with sorrow ; all 
her loveliness was under eclipse, for tears had been her 
only food, and peace and sleep had fled her pillow, since 
her father's spirit had gone away, and left her alone 
in the world. She then added, ee Oh ! stranger, be 
good to her, and all good will be yours in possessing 
her!" 



CHAPTER IX. 

She like a moon in wane, 
Faded before him, cower'd, nor could restrain 
Her fearful sobs, self- folding like a flower 
That faints into itself at evening hour Keats. 

This ring ****** 

'Tis chosen, I hear, from Hymen's jewelry. Keats's MS. 

She went to prepare the lady Zela, and, had I been a hot 
and impatient lover, she left me time to cool. Possibly 



A YOUNGER SON. 197 

the very thought that I was not going to woo, but was 
already fast wedded, helped to make the hour and a half, 
before she returned, appear neither more nor less than 
ninety minutes. Nor did I make any pretty invocations 
to Time, with leaden or swallow wings. It might be 
that about this time of the day, I had a particular relish 
for smoking my callian, and sipping my coffee. I have 
never quitted this vice, or rather virtue ; for, at this very 
time, I am as surly, if called away in the morning ere I 
have had my pipe and coffee, as a judge, when a jury finds 
a verdict according to their conscience, and against his 
summing up ; or, as a bull -dog with his bone, when an 
impudent cur offers to knab it ; or as a woman, detecting 
her wearied husband in the act of moving her new bonnet 
off the sofa to repose himself. 

I sat inhaling the last whiff of the fragrant tombacae of 
Shiraz, through rose-water from Benares. I filled my 
lungs with a delicious cloud, which seemed to circulate 
throughout my body ; and I sent it forth again like a jet 
of water, or frankincense burning from an altar, or from 
a swinging chalice, or like the spiral wreath from a cottage 
chimney, — for I was comparing it to all these ; and so 
intently wrapt in watching and admiring the rainbow-like 
tints, borrowed from the sun, glittering upon the vapour, 
as I eked it out from my compressed lips and nostrils, with 
my cheeks swollen like a trumpeter's, that I had not seen 
the old Arab woman return. .1 suppose her beauties too 
were, like the moon, under a cloud, or in an eclipse ; for 
her dark figure startled me, and I thought of the tale of 
the fisherman, and that the smoke had condensed itself 
into a black witch. She informed me that the lady Zela 
had been awaiting me with coffee and sweatmeats, till the 
one was cold, and the other turned sour, 

" No one has been here," I replied, " to tell me she 
was ready.'' 

She looked sour enough to have spoilt the sweatmeats 
at a glanee, as she said querulously, u I have been stand- 
ing here so long, that, see — my feet are grown to the 
wood ! " 

I laughed ; for she was so far right that the sun and 
o 3 



];}S ADVENTURES OF 

heat of her foot had melted the pitch ; and she had some 
difficulty, as the vessel was heeling over, to keep her ba- 
lance, while she disengaged her hoof. Saying all I could 
to soften her, down we went together. 

The cabin door was opened by a little Malayan slave 
girl, from the coast of Malabar, whom I had sent as my 
first gift, and I entered. The lady mine was seated cross- 
legged on a low couch, so shrouded and enveloped in white 
drapery, the mourning of her country, that I could dis- 
tinguish nothing of those wondrous beauties the old Arab 
woman had talked of. On my entrance I thought her 
one of those marble figures I had heard of in Egyptian 
temples ; but I found she was alive. Her feet were bare ; 
she rose and placed them in embroidered slippers, which 
lay on the deck of the cabin ; she took my hand, put it 
to her forehead, then to her lips : I entreated her to be 
seated. She resumed her position, and remained motion- 
less, her arms drooping listlessly down; her little rosy 
feet nestled under her, like tiny birds under the mother's 
wing. Her hair, the only part now visible, covered her 
like a jet black cloud. I had felt the pressure of her tre- 
mulous lips ; and imagination, or perhaps some faint out- 
line which fancy had left graved on my hand, pictured 
her mouth exquisitely soft and small, — (I loathe a large 
and hard one) ; and I think now, this silent pressure wove 
the first link of that diamond chain which time nor use 
could ever break or wear away. I seemed entranced. We 
both sat silent ; and I felt it a relief when the old Arab 
woman returned with coffee, and mangastene and guava 
jelly. She again rose, which I would have prevented, but 
the old woman signed me to sit still. She took a minute 
cup, in a filagree silver stand, and presented it to me. 
I was so intently gazing on her tapering, delicately formed 
fingers, that I upset tfre coffee, and, putting the cup to 
my mouth, was going to swallow that ; which indeed, as 
it was not bigger than the spicy shell of mace that holds 
the nutmeg, I might have done without choking. The 
old woman told me afterwards this was a bad omen. She 
then presented the conserves ; and, returning the stand to 
the woman, resumed her seat. 



A YOUNGER SON. 199 

Taking from ray hand a ring of gold, with an Arabic 
inscription, and hooped with two circles of camel's hair, 
the same her expiring father had placed on my ringer, I 
held it towards her. The low and suppressed moans she 
made on my entrance hroke out into sobs, so violent that 
I could see her loose vest agitated by the beating of her 
heart. I was about to remove this object, which awakened 
such painful remembrances, when she grasped it, pressed 
it to her lips, and wept over it some time. The woman 
then said something to her ; and, without the guidance of 
her eyes, she again put forth her tapering little ringers, 
and replaced the ring. It was indeed the antique signet 
of her father's tribe ; and, like the seal of princes, it made 
right wrong, or wrong right, and gave, and took away, and 
made, and unmade laws, obeying the will of its wearer. 
She put it on the fore finger of my right hand ; and again 
pressed my hand to her head and lips. 

Upon this I took a ring I had selected from De Ruyter's 
store of baubles ; it was a deep ruby, of the shape and 
size of a wild grape, hooped and massy with virgin gold, 
and, by its size, seemed to have been worn by a fairy. 
Gently disengaging her hand from the drapery as it lay 
montionless by her side, I placed this ring on the fore 
finger of her right hand ; — the old woman smiled. Then 
I put her little palm to my lips, and repeatedly kissed it ; 
— the old woman's brow darkened, or rather the wrinkles 
on her brow deepened, for her colour, by time and the 
sun, was fixed into an indelible bronze. However, taking 
the hint, I let go the hand, and it dropped by her side. 

This interchange of rings was a definite acknowledg- 
ment of our union. I now asked the lady if I could do 
any thing to add to her comfort on board the ship. I 
told her I had collected and released all I could find of 
the tribe of her father ; that they should be kindly at- 
tended to ; that I was a stranger, and ignorant of many 
of their customs, entreating that she would direct me ; 
that our Rais was a good man, and would love her like 
a father. Ker sobs now became more violent. Catching 
the infection of melancholy, I put my hand to my heart, 
and said, " Dear sister, moderate your grief. Command 
o 4 



200 ADVENTURES OF 

me in all things ; for am I not your happy slave ? " She 
did nothing hut weep, and I withdrew. 



CHAPTER X. 

The simplest flowers 
In the world's herbal ; — this fair lily blanch 'd, 
Still with the dews of piety ; this meeK lady 
Here sitting, like an angel newly shent, 
Who veils his snowy wings and grows all pale. Keats's MS. 

Thus passed my first visit, and many successive ones. It 
was long ere I heard the music of her voice. I thought 
she was mute as well as motionless ; but, distracted by the 
busy turmoil of our now crowded vessel, my visits to the 
silent lady were not irksome. I culled every thing I thought 
would amuse or please her ; made strict search, amidst the 
heaps of plunder we had taken from the Maratti, for every 
thing belonging to her father, and his people, which was 
restored; and I was unwearied in attempts to win her regard. 
Yet so long she remained insensible, that I thought I might 
as well have worshipped a mummy from the pyramids ; 
and had not my impatience been listened to, and soothed, 
by the kind-hearted Aston, I should have expressed my dis- 
satisfaction to the lady herself, and totally have withdrawn 
from her, as my presence seemed offensive. 

Perhaps that would have been no easy task. For though 
I could never interchange speech with Zela, the old Arab 
woman was not so reserved. She would stop in the midst 
of every errand, as she crossed the deck, and talk of nothing 
but her lady Zela. At first I cursed her garrulity, as my 
legs grew weary with standing; I thought she would have 
talked them off, for nothing would induce her to be seated. 
No ! she must not sit in the presence of her malik; besides, 
her mistress was waiting for water, coffee, sweetmeats, or 
something else, Methought her mistress must be won- 
•derous patient for the moon wasted ere her discourse con- 
cluded, 



A YOUNGER SON. 201 

At last she instilled into me hopes that Zela was not in- 
sensible of my kindness ; that she said I was very good, 
. — I must be, for her people said so ; that it was a pity I 
spoke her language so imperfectly, and was a stranger of a 
far distant tribe ; she was sorry the great kala panee (black 
water) was between our fathers' lands ; but I was gentle, 
kind, beautiful as a zebra, and she liked to hear my voice. 

This delicious poison relumed my expiring hopes ; the 
dark old woman grew bright and entertaining, and her 
harsh voice sounded sweet. My night watches seemed 
miraculously diminished. Yet I had seen no more of Zela 
than her foot and head ; the tone of her voice I was as yet 
a stranger to. 

How then could I love her ? I had never felt, or seen, 
or dreamt of the strange power of love. Indeed I know 
not when, or why, or where, or how he found entrance 
even in my thoughts. It appeared to me I was only ful- 
filling a duty, sacred from its having been laid on me by 
the impressive energy of a dying parent, consigning to me, 
with his last breath, his friendless child. In the crystal 
purity of youth, this was the first impressive scene, in which 
I had been the principal actor, in which the emphatic appeal 
w r as made to the good feelings of my heart, a sealed foun- 
tain, then broken ; and pity, and sorrow, and now love were 
flowing from it like a swollen torrent, which bears down all 
before it. The poor little captive bird was building her 
nest in my bosom's cove, whilst I thought her quietly caged 
in my cabin below. My visits grew longer and more fre- 
quent. I retained her passive hand in mine, till I felt its 
warmth restored, and fancied it glowing with mine. The 
very air about her seemed to grow heavy with fragrant 
odour. Even the touch of her insensible hair, more grace- 
ful than the willow's pendent boughs, as it kissed my cheek, 
filled my soul with passion. All my senses seemed ex- 
quisitely refined, and a world of new thoughts and delicate 
fancies to have birth within me. As I at last caught the 
full radiant brightness of her large dark eye, my limbs shook, 
my voice trembled, and my heart beat convulsively, and 
fast. Holding her hand, I gazed in speechless eestacy* 
Whether she observed, I know T not j but she removed her 



202 ADVENTURES OF 

hand, and veiled the brightness of her eyes. It was enough ; 
they had thrilled through me, and the fire was inextin- 
guishable. She had murmured some words in a broken voice, 
which buzzed in my ears like a honeyed bee's, or like the 
warbling of the humming-bird, that lives in the cinnamon 
groves, and her breath was sweeter than the trees on which 
it lives. My senses ached with the intensity of the new 
world of delight which opened to me. 

And love was thus ignited in my breast, pure, ardent, 
deep, and imperishable. Zela, from that day, was the star 
I was destined to worship ; the deity at whose altar I was 
to offer up all the fragrant incense of my first virgin affec- 
tions, feelings, and passions. Nor did ever saintly votary 
dedicate himself to his god with intenser devotion than I 
consecrated my heart to Zela. When dull mortality returns 
to dust, when the spirit bursts its charnel- vault, and wings 
its way, like a dove, it will find no resting-place, or olive 
branch of peace, till reunited with Zela's ; then will they 
blend, two sunbeams together, shining onward to eternity. 



CHAPTER XL 

And then he went on shore without delay, 

Having no custom-house nor quarantine 
To ask him awkward questions on the way, 

About the times and place where he had been : 
He left his ship to be hove down next day, 

With orders to the people to careen, 
So that all hands were busy beyond measure, 
In getting out goods, ballast, guns, and treasure. Byron. 

No other circumstance, of any importance, dwells on my 
mind during this eventful cruise. We were now in the 
latitude of the Mauritius, thirty -two leagues N.W. of the 
Isle of Bourbon. The Mauritius was first called by the 
Portuguese, on their visit in 1521, Swan Island, from being 
a favourite resort of that bird. The grasping Dutch were 
the first to lay their hands on it, yet not till long after, 



A YOUNGER SON. 203 

somewhere about 1600. They named it the Mauritius, 
complimenting^ in this appellation, the admiral of the 
United Provinces. The French, as I have already related, 
succeeded them, and called it the Isle of France; and it 
was the rallying point and rendezvous of all their cruisers. 
Nearly in the track of the company's homeward and outward 
bound Indian fleets, of the departure of which care was 
taken to procure early intelligence, they sent their ships of 
war to cruise for them in the latitudes of their usual route. 
But it was from private ships of war, with commissions of 
lettres de marque, that the English merchant-fleet princi- 
pally suffered. Against the large French ships they were 
protected by efficient convoy of their own men-of-war; but 
the smaller, fast-sailing French cruisers, filled with desperate 
adventurers, hung round their fleets, like the wandering 
Arabs on the desert round a caravan ; while the English 
men-of-war were withheld from pursuing them, fearful of 
losing sight of the merchantmen, and of their being attacked 
by others in their absence. The Frenchmen rarely ventured 
near them during the day, or when it was fine weather, 
unless supported by some of their own frigates, following 
them in the hope of cutting off stragglers. In bad weather, 
daring dark nights, they deceived them, by making false 
signals to lure them off; or during the heavy and sudden 
squalls which prevail in those latitudes, in the event of any 
accident happening, such as losing a mast, or, what fre- 
quently was the case, losing sight of their convoy, they 
were certain of attack from one or more of these French 
privateers. But being all well armed, and very large ships, 
they sometimes succeeded in defending themselves, not only 
from the private ships of war, but, on more than one oc- 
casion, they gallantly beat off a French squadron. 

The French found the Mauritius of essential import- 
ance; enabling them to harass the English commerce, and 
to preserve a footing in India. They spared no expense in 
fortifying it ; and, to confess the truth, they were not back- 
ward in improving it, by rendering it useful and productive. 
They introduced, and cultivated with success, most of the 
spices and fruits of India, with rice, and all sorts of corn 
from Bourbon, Cochin China, and Madagascar. But the 



204 ADVENTURES OF 

island being small, not more than nineteen leagues in cir- 
cumference, of course all this was on a proportionally limited 
scale. The Dutch, by their neglect, had allowed the most 
valuable port, on the N.W. coast, to be choked with their 
own filth, and mud and stones washed down by the torrents 
from the mountains rising close to it. The French, under 
a clever and enterprising governor, cleared this harbour, 
built a good wall, and made a superb basin for their ships 
of war, sheltered from all winds, which are here occasion- 
ally terrific. 

We made the island of Bourbon, then hauled up to the 
Mauritius, which we soon after got sight of. This island 
is of an oval form, and that part we now coasted, on the 
N. W., was grand and rugged, with occasional verdant cover. 
De Ruyter observed that this side of it had been turned 
topsyturvy by the agency of volcanoes ; and that it was 
thought, by observers in these matters, to have been for- 
merly united with the Isle of Bourbon, but torn asunder 
by the convulsion of internal fire. We saw many huge 
arched caverns, into which the sea was rolling with a hollow, 
thundering voice. Grey and ragged fragments of calcined 
rocks were piled on each other in fantastic disorder. The 
land then rose gradually from the cliffs to the centre of the 
island, terminating in a mountain, which rose like a dome. 
De Ruyter told us this was an elevated plain, thirteen 
hundred feet above the sea ; and though, from this side, it 
appeared a precipitous mpuntain, on the other side, at Port 
St. Louis, the ascent was so gradual, that a horse might 
gallop up nearly to the the summit, which was pointed 
like a sugar-loaf, called Piton du milieu, and surrounded by 
a plain. We saw seven other mountains, looking like seven 
giants seated in conference. Many low capes stretched out 
into the sea, and, winding their rocky roots yet farther, 
formed beautiful bays, with white sandy beaches, and nar- 
row valleys, often intersected by streams or rivers, verdant 
and wooded, and thickly set with shrubs and flowers. 

As Aston and myself stood watching these with our 
glasses, I said, " How quiet and exquisitely beautiful is 
that ! Oh let us go and dwell there ! " Then, as that shut 
in, and another opened far more beautiful, -and then another. 



A YOUNGER SON. 905 

and another still, 1 reiterated the same exclamation. We 
all three loved nature, and De Ruyter took delight in point- 
ing out to us every minute change in the scenery. u Surely," 
I cried, "" this island is a paradise of the Eastern poets ! 
Who but a fool, once on this land, would leave it ? Oh let 
us forsake the never-certain ocean, which, with its treach- 
erous smiles, lures us on to sickness, disappointment, pain, 
and death ! " 

Aston was not less delighted than myself; and there 
was a willing alacrity and lightness in the movements of 
all on board. Joy spread in every countenance, every 
source of discontent was forgotten, and all was union and 
harmony. As we let the anchor go, the men flew aloft 
like birds, and the sails were furled in an instant. Canoes 
almost sinking with their cargoes of fresh fish, fruit, and 
vegetables, were hovering round us. 

The pleasure which filled my heart was augmented to 
overflowing by the dear presence of my little eastern fairy 
Zela, who, yielding to my earnest prayers, had allowed 
me to lead her on deck. As the gentle air waved her 
light gauzy robes aside, or pressed them closer to her, 
played with her hair, and showed her youthful form, 
which seemed almost suspended in its own lightness, Aston 
gazed at her with astonishment, and compared . her to 
a young fawn by the side of a stag. De Ruyter, who 
spoke her language perfectly, took her hand, but was so 
surprised at her beauty, that it was some time before he 
could utter a word, though she was then pallid and wan, 
and her lips colourless. He talked to her in his most 
soothing manner ; then, turning to me, said, " This 
is some little eastern sprite, too delicate and frail to be 
touched by human hands ! I may now congratulate you 
with all my heart ; nor lives there a man so cold as not 
to envy your good fortune. By Heaven ! I thought you 
were making a sacrifice, and I find you have a jewel, 
which kings, if they had hearts, would give their crowns 
to possess ! Knowing this, if you do not treasure her as 
such, may happiness forsake you for ever ! Fortune can 
can never again give any thing so far above comparison." 

She looked round like a frighted antelope, with wonder 



206 ADVENTURES OF 

at finding herself surrounded by so many strangers, all 
gazing on her; and her face was crimsoned like the 
morning clouds. She would have returned below, but her 
hand was shackled in mine. I sent for a carpet and 
cushions, and she sat down on deck, encircled with 
women. 



CHAPTER XII. 

Worse than a bloody hand is a hard heart. Shelley. 

Thou bitter mischief, venomous, bad priest I Keats's MS. 

De Ruyter went onboard the corvette, to tell her captain 
that the English frigates had left their blockade of the 
leeward port. This was occasioned by the loss of their 
men and boats, and in order to return to Madras before 
the S.W. monsoon set in. Besides, as the homeward- 
bound fleet was supposed to have passed the latitudes of 
these islands, their object in blockading was effected. It 
was then determined that the corvette, after getting a sup- 
ply of water and fresh provisions, was to go round to Port 
St. Louis ; and that De Ruyter, by crossing over land, 
was to meet the captain there, and give their despatches 
to the French general commanding. 

This done, he returned on board, when we sent all our 
prisoners and wounded on board the corvette, and De 
Ruyter went on shore to provide accommodations for his 
own sick, and procure supplies. The next morning he 
left us for the town and port of St. Louis. He gave me 
directions what to do in his absence, and promised to be 
with us at latest in three days. We shook hands and 
parted. 

It was arranged that when the grab was cleared, we 
should lay her up, and proceed to De Ruyter 's country 
house ; he possessed a considerable estate in the interior 
of the island. 



A YOUNGER SON. 207 

It is worthy of remark that, regarding climate, this 
island has a peculiarity I never remember to have found 
in any other in India. Other islands are comparatively 
cool and pleasant on the coasts, and close and unhealthy 
in the interior, unless on the heights. Here it is reversed : 
the entire coast is so scorchingly hot, and the air so bad, 
that at Port St. Louis, and other places round, no one 
dares venture out in the daytime during six months of 
the year, as he may be almost certain of having a sun- 
stroke, which occasions a brain-fever, the malignant fever, 
cholera morbus, or dysentery ; while, at the same period, 
in the interior, particularly on the windward side, the air 
is temperate and salubrious. For six months in the year, 
from November to April, the town of St. Louis is insuf- 
ferably and noxiously hot; scarcely any one but the 
slaves could be induced to remain there, the free inhabit- 
ants departing for the interior. Then again, the dry 
months at Port St. Louis are the rainy ones in the central 
parts ; and whilst the fiercest hurricanes are raging on 
the coast, a few miles inland all is calm and sunshine. 
I have repeatedly witnessed this ; and it is strange in so 
small an island. 

With a nature ardent, active, and enterprising, my soul 
was in what I undertook, and with unwearied diligence I 
executed De Ruyter's behests* Watching and toil were 
to me pleasure ; for my body was strong, and my spirits 
winged. Magazines of spars, planks, and matting were 
speedily erected on the shore ; every article not pertaining 
to the vessel was landed and daily sent round on the 
backs of mules, asses, and slaves — (the last, 1 sha<me to 
say, were the chief animals of burthen on the island) — 
and transported, with proper precautions, to the town of 
Port St. Louis. 

De Ruyter had made great exertions and sacrifices in 
the importation of buffaloes and asses, to supersede the 
use of slaves, in the degrading and painful toil of bearing 
burthens in a climate of almost insufferable heat. But the 
cold indifference with which men, solely devoted to mer- 
cenary pursuits, treated his humane propositions, made it 
up-hill work. These heartless traffickers could neither see 



^208 ADVENTURES OF 

nor hear of any plan, except such as tended to their own 
immediate profit. With them the common organs of 
nature became brutalised ; their views of things were 
narrowed into the circumference of actual sight ; and as 
the wasp, with an eye like a lens, magnifying into bulk the 
minutest objects within an inch of its optics, cannot dis- 
tinguish, at the distance of a yard, a wall from a wall- 
flower, so was it with these fellows. There was no use in 
talking of to-morrow, of what could be then done with 
mules and buffaloes, because with slaves they could realise 
a profit to-day. As to human suffering, they not being 
touched with human feeling, how could that influence 
them ? (C Is that the law ? — I cannot find it, 'tis not in 
my bond," — is the sum of their ready reply to the advo- 
cates of humanity. To every appeal they are deaf as cro- 
codiles ; and while you are talking of humanity, they will 
lash, or order to be goaded, the bare and festered back of 
an overloaded female slave, her tender nature one animated 
mass of ulcers and cancers, half consumed alive by flies 
and maggots, antedating their destined prey. Then, 
what the free and happy most fear — death — is her only 
hope and refuge, and comes like a bridegroom ; when the 
corrupted mass is cast uncoffined into the sea, or in a 
ditch, where the dog-fish, or the wild dog, famishing, will 
turn from it, — the worms' leavings. Thus it is with her, 
and with harder and more enduring man. I have seen 
their spines knotted as a pine tree, and their skins as scaled 
and callous, with the flesh cracked into chasms, from 
which blood oozed out like gum, as hundreds of them, 
poor wretches ! underwent their daily toil in the dock- 
yard at Port St. Louis, under a sun so scorching, that • 
their task -masters, shaded, sheltered, and reclining, have 
gasped as from suffocation ; and. when, from the mere 
exertion of moving a few yards, at a snail's pace, to give 
commands; their bodies have reeked with moisture, and 
larded the earth, like a horse's after a race in July. The 
pity and pain I felt at the sight of these poor slaves, could 
only be equalled by the deep and overwhelming damnation 
I invoked on the heads of their inhuman oppressors, them 
and their kind for ever ! Surely monsters like these are 



A YOUNGER SON. 21K) 

annihilated, — they cannot be immortal ! Yet they should 
be so, with an eternity to torture them in, They should 
have justice and their bond ; and what they have done 
to others should be done to them ; and I defy the inven- 
tion of hell's fabled demons to be more cunning in cruelty 
than themselves. 

This barbarous treatment of the slaves, though not to 
the extent which I afterwards witnessed on the other side 
of the island, impelled me on, if a spur was wanting, to 
despatch my business in Port Bourbon, that I might has- 
ten to the secluded, wild, and wooded hill, De Ruyter had 
pointed out as the place of his residence. There, I knew, 
where he had power, pain and oppression would be sof- 
tened, if not driven away altogether. 

At the appointed period De Ruyter returned. Active 
and energetic as he was in all he did, he was surprised 
at our expedition. The burthened hull and lofty-rigged 
vessel, which, a few days before, had come into the port 
half buried by her weight, with clouds of canvass on her, 
now floated as light as a sea-bird sleeping, her canvass 
unbent, masts and yards struck, dismantled, and moored 
close to the shore. 

De Ruyter informed Aston that he had obtained per- 
mission for himself, and the four men belonging to the 
frigate, whom we had kept on board, to remain with him, 
on his parole for himself and them. 

We were discoursing of the slaves when he came in. 
He told us this tale, in his pithy and abrupt manner : 
Ci Two days ago I went to the door-way (for I never ven- 
ture farther) of a church they were consecrating, to seek 
for a slave-dealer, with whom I had business. He is a 
cruel villain, but a punctilious, sanctimonious, and sour 
church-goer ; a fellow who, if there remained but one 
man besides himself in the island, and if their faiths dif- 
fered but in the breadth of a hair, would, by force or 
stratagem, stake or burn him. You shall hear : the 
church, flagged with white pavement, was blotted by half 
a score of black priests. There was a mass of people to 
see the ceremony ; and these priests looked like the 
smutted ears bound up with a sheaf of corn. I was going 



210 ADVENTURES OP 

a way^ for I grew sick, from the filthy compound smell of 
frankincense, sweat, and garlic, all mingled. An ignorant 
converted slave entered, who, seeing some muddy water in 
a stone basin at the portal, concluded it was for ablution. 
He, therefore, laved his tarred and begrimed arms in it, 
up to the elbows. A missionary priest, observing this, 
struck him over the pate with the cross, on which was 
bedaubed, as if in mockery, a gory Christ. The cross, 
being of the same materials as the priest's heart, iron- 
wood and ebony, was heavy. The priest was strong and 
malignant. It crushed the fellow's bare head, and entered 
the brain ; — the first good act a bigoted priest committed, 
for the slave was emancipated/' 

u What did they with the assassin ?" exclaimed Aston. 

u I know," answered De Ruyter, ce what they would 
have done with you, if they had heard you so call him. 
Why, they drowned the victim's death-scream with bel- 
lowing Te Deum, mopped their sweating brows, and went 
and feasted at the slave-butcher's house. As to poor 
negur man, I saw his carcass to-day, as I rode along at 
high water-mark, a banquet for the land-crabs. These 
are the staunch upholders of the Pope's bloody banner, 
and these the arguments used for the conversion of unbe- 
lievers. At Rome is the main-spring of this faith, which 
I liken to a banian tree : for every branch from the main 
body throws out its own roots, — at first in small tender 
fibres, but continually growing thicker, by gradual descent, 
they get within the surface of the earth ; where, sticking 
in, they increase to large trunks, and each becomes a 
parent tree, throwing out new branches from the top ; 
these, in time, suspend their root, and receiving nourish- 
ment, swell into trunks, and shoot forth other branches ; 
thus continuing in a state of progression, so long as the 
first parent of them all supplies its sustenance." 

" No more of this !" said I ; lC let us hasten to our 
quarters on the Ml!, away from priests and slaves ! " 



A YOUNGER SON, 211 



CHAPTER XIII. 

Soft mossy lawns 
Beneath these canopies extend their swells, 
Fragrant with perfumed herbs, and eyed with blooms, 
Minute yet beautiful. Shelley. 

No tumbling water ever spake romance, 

But when my eyes with thine thereon could dance j 

No woods were green enough, no bower divine, 

Until thou liftedst up thine eyelids fine. Keats. 

In a few days more, all our arrangements being made, and 
the Rais left on board in command, De Ruyter, Aston, and 
myself, with the gentle Zela, and her attendants, went on 
shore as the day broke. We commenced our journey in- 
land, with mules, ponies, and asses. We went some dis- 
tance along the pebbly margin of the shore, beautifully 
tesselated with a variety of shells, of all colours and shapes. 
Then crossing an arid plain, we wound up a rocky, rugged 
ascent, on a path with only room for one mule. I walked 
by the side of Zela's little horse, and pointed out to her the 
sublime beauty of the scenery. As the grey mist was eva- 
porating, the tops of the cone-like hills were left bare, 
while their bases were still hidden by the vapours. They 
looked like a group of beautiful islands or black swans, 
floating in a calm and silent lake, some feathered to the 
very crest with shrubs and bushes; some with majestic 
timber, the palm and cedar ; and others blasted by volcanic 
fire. 

Zela had the blood of a fearless race. She had been 
bred and schooled amidst peril always at hand. Not 
having learnt to afreet what she did not feel, she crossed 
ravines, wound along precipices, and waded through streams 
and rivers, not only without impeding us by enacting a 
pantomimic representation of fears, tears, entreaties, pray- 
ers, screaming, and fainting ; but she was such a simpleton 
as not even to notice them, unless, in the usual sweet, low 
tone of her voice, to remark that they were delightful 
places to sit in during the sultry part of the day ; or she 
would stop her pony over a precipice to gather some 
p 2 



212 ADVENTURES OP 

curious flowers drooping from a natural arch ; or to pluck 
the pendant and waving boughs of the most graceful of 
Indian trees, the imperial mimosa, sensitive and sacred as 
love, shrinking from the touch of the profane. 

e< Put this," she said, holding out a branch, <c in your 
turban ; for I am sure in some of these hollow caves and 
dreary chasms the ogres live ; they feed their young with 
human blood, and they love to give them the young and 
beautiful. Put it in your turban, brother, — since you say 
I must not call you master; — and never frown, — I do 
not like to see it, for then you are not so handsome, — I 
mean good, — as when you smile. Do not laugh, but take 
it. It will preserve you from every spell and magic, 
Nothing bad dares come near it." 

While crossing a sandy level, suddenly she started, as 
her eye caught some object. Without stopping her horse, 
which was ambling along, she sprang off, and ran up a 
sand-hill, like a white doe. Never having witnessed any 
thing like this before, I was so astonished that she was 
returning, ere I could overtake her to ask if an ogre had 
lured her with his evil eye. " O, no," she cried, — Cl look 
here ! You like flowers, but did you ever see any one so 
lovely as this? Smell it, — 'tis so sweet that the rose, if 
growing near it, loses its beauty and fragrance, from envy 
of its rival." 

Certainly I thought she was bewitched. It was a 
glaring, large, red bough, full of blowzy blossoms, and 
yellow berries, with a musky fcetid odour. C( Why," I 
exclaimed, " you have as much reason to be jealous of old 
Kamalia, your nurse, as the rose to be jealous of such a 
scraggy bramble as this ! Faugh ! the smell makes me 
sick." 

I suppose I was instigated to make this rude speech by 
her fondling and kissing it. Her dark eyes expanded ; 
and she seemed, for an instant, to view me with astonish- 
ment, then with sorrow ; as they closed, I perceived that 
their brightness was gone, and the long jetty fringe, which 
arched upwards as it pressed her cheek, was covered with 
little pearly dew-drops. The branch fell from her hand 
under my feet, her sprightly form drooped, and the tones 



A YOUNGER SON. 213 

of her voice reminded me of the time when she hung over 
her dying parent as she said, c< Pardon me, stranger ! I 
had forgotten you are not of my father's land. This tree 
covered my father's tent, sheltered us from the sun,, and 
kept away the flies,, when we slept in the day. Our virgins 
wreathe it in their hair ; and, if they die,, it is strewn over 
their graves. So, I cant help loving it hetter than any 
thing. But, since you say it makes you sick, I won't love 
it, or gather it any more." Then her words became 
almost inarticulate from sobbing, as she added, <e Why 
should I wear it now ? I belong to a stranger ! My 
father is gone ! " 

I need scarcely say that I not only returned the flowers, 
and pleaded my ignorance ; but I went up the hill, and 
pulled up the tree by the roots. (e Sweet sister," said I, 
" I was only angry with it because you abused the fa- 
voured tree of our country, the rose. But now, as the sun 
shines on it, and I see it nearer," — looking at her, — ie I 
do think the rose may envy it, as the loveliest of my 
countrywomen might envy you. I '11 plant it in our garden." 

ee O, how good you are!" she exclaimed; iC and I '11 plant 
a rose near it, and they shall mingle their sweets ; for our 
love and care of them will make them live together with- 
out envy. Every thing should love each other. I love 
every tree, and fruit, and flower." 

Still I observed, as her thin robes were disarranged, that 
her little downy bosom fluttered like an imprisoned bird 
panting for liberty ; and, to turn her thoughts from what 
had pained her, I said, " Do not fear, dear Zela. That 
is the last stream we have to cross ; and then we shall 
ride over that beautiful plain." 

" O, stranger !" she replied, " 7*e\& never feared any 
thing, but her father, when angry ; and then, those who 
feared not to gaze on the lightning, when all the world 
appeared to be on fire, feared to look in his face. Then 
his voice was louder than the thunder, and his lance deadlier 
than the thunderbolt. Last evening, when you talked to 
that tall man, who is so gentle, you looked like my father ; 
and I thought you were going to kill him, and I wanted 
to tell you not; for I have read his eyes, and he loves 
p 3 



214 ADVENTURES OF 

you much. It is very bad to be angry with those that 
love us." 

(i Oh, you mean Aston ! No, dear, I was not angry 
with him. I love him too. We were talking of the 
horrid cruelties practised on the poor slaves here ; and I 
was angry at that." 

" I wish I knew your language ! How I should have 
loved to hear you ! And then I should have slept ; but 
being ignorant of that, I did nothing but weep, because I 
thought I saw you angry with one that loves you." 

De Ruyter now came up, and we suddenly stood on the 
elevated plain, called Vacois, in the centre of the island. 
Our ascent had been very abrupt, winding, and rugged. 
Before us, in the middle of the plain, on which we now 
rode, was the pyramidical mountain I have already noticed, 
under the name of Piton du Milieu. Inclining to our 
right was the port and town of St. Louis. To the south 
were large plains, in rich vegetation, divided by a fine river, 
with one solitary hill. To the north were other plains, 
inclining to the sea, white, as if the briny waters had 
recently receded from them, and only partially cultivated 
with sugar-canes, indigo, and, in the marshy spots, with 
rice. From south to east it was volcanic and mountainous, 
with jungle and ancient forests. The north-east was, for 
the most part, level. The plain, where we were, was full 
of little sheets of deep war, forming themselves into pretty 
lakes ; which, overflowing during the heavy rains, at times 
made the plain swampy, and ever overgrown with canes, 
reeds, and gigantic grass. Such was the diversified and 
beautiful scenery now disclosed, as the sun, having risen 
above the mountains in the east, dissipated the yellow 
mists, and laid bare the hitherto obscured beauties of this 
divine island, like a virgin unrobed for bathing. 

We alighted under the shade of a group of the rose-apple 
trees, which seemed to have drawn a charmed circle round 
a solitary oak, on the brink of a lake, clear as a diamond, 
and apparently of amazing depth, the golden Chinese fish 
sporting on its surface, and green, yellow, and blue dra- 
gon-flies darting here and there above it. The modest 
wood-pigeon and dove, disturbed in their morning ablu- 



A YOUNGER SON. 215 

tions, flew away to the woods. The gray partridge ran into 
the vacour, which stood in thick lines on the Drink, impene- 
trable from its long fibrous leaves, standing out like a pha- 
lanx of lances. The water-hens dived, and the parrots 
chattered on the trees, as if they had been peopled with 
scolding married women; whilst the sluggish baboon sat, 
with portly belly, gormandising with the voracity and 
gravity of a monk, regardless of all but the stuffing of his 
insatiable maw with bananas. 

We were told that there were, in this lake, prawns as 
big as lobsters, and eels of incredible size, from fifteen to 
twenty feet long. The two principal rivers took their rise 
from this plain, augmenting in their course by the tribute 
of an infinity of streamlets; till swollen into bulk and 
strength, like two rival monarchs, they ran parallel for a 
while, trying to outvie each other in pomp and velocity^ 
springing over their rocky beds. After some distance they 
separated to the right and left, and passed through their 
different districts, to pay, in their turn, tribute to the 
mightier ocean. 



CHAPTER XIV. 

The oak 
Expanding its immeasurable arms 
Embraces the light beech. The pyramids 
Of the tall cedar, overarching, frame 
Most solemn domes within ; and far below, 
Like clouds suspended in an emerald sky, 
The ash and the acacia floating hang, 
Tremulous and pale. The parasites, 
Starr'd with ten thousand blossoms, flow around 
The grey trunks. Shelley. 

After the senses were satiated by the matchless beauties 
of nature, our grosser appetites prevailed, craving some of 
her solid bounties. Fish, fruits, and other simple fare, a 
sailor's greatest luxury, were spread out in abundance. 
We devoured them with truly sacerdotal zeal. Meanwhile, 
p 4 



216 ADVENTURES OF 

the odour of citron s, raspberries, guavas, wild mangoes,, 
and strawberries, with countless herbs and aromatic plants 
and shrubs,, ascending up the valley with the morning 
dew, filled us with exquisite sensations of delight. My 
limbs, light and elastic, impelled me to believe I could 
have outrun the deer, which, from time to time, we saw 
crossing the opening glades, and dashing into the coverts. 

A portion of the pleasure I felt infused itself into the 
mind of Zela. This was the first time we had eaten bread 
and salt together. As I remarked it to her, she smiled, 
and said, " Yes, now we must be friends ! And, if you 
keep our country's customs, you must not even frown on 
me, your guest, till the sun shall set, and again dawn/' 

While strolling together, and gathering flowers, 1 
I questioned her respecting their classification, — not th< 
botanical, but the oriental one of love; but De Ruytei 
soon halooed us to horse. 

We left the lake on our right, skirted the base of Pitoi 
du Milieu, over a volcanic soil of pulverized cinders, and 
by gentle descents, proceeded towards the south. Agair 
we were among mountains, passing green lawns, and 
marshes overgrown with vitti-vert (which is used for 
thatching), fern, marshmallows, waving bamboos, and 
wild tobacco. We saw plantations of the manioc (bread- 
fruit), maize, sweet potatoes, the cotton-tree, the sugar- 
cane, coffee, and cloves. Then we crossed rocky channels 
of clear rippling water, hedged by dwarf oaks and the 
dusky-coloured olive, underneath which flourished the 
dark-green fig-tree, with its strawberry-red marrowy fruit, 
bared by the bursting of its emerald-green rind. Here 
the majestic palmiste towered grandly alone, crowned with 
its first, tardy, and only fruit ; and when deprived of that 
diadem, like earthly monarchs, it perishes. We penetrated 
the wild native woods, where grew the iron- wood tree, the 
oak, the black cinnamon, the apple, the acacia, the tama- 
rind, and the nutmeg. Our path was arched by wild 
vines, jessamine, and a multitude of deep scarlet-blos- 
somed creepers, so thickly interlaced in their living 
cordage, that neither sun nor storm could penetrate them ; 
or if a wandering beam found entrance through the thick 



A YOUNGER SON. 21? 

natural trelliee-work, it was only enough to cover some 
little tuft of violets or strawberries, its own offspring, 
growing up in its genial warmth with a strength and 
vigour pre-eminent amidst the pale and sickly brood of the 
neglected children of the shade. Nothing I had ever 
imagined of the loveliness of nature equalled the reality of 
these scenes. Among such fairy haunts, created for a 
sylvan people, we appeared intruders; and, for the first 
time, methought De Ruyter's and Aston' s voices were 
harsh, and their manly figures and weather-strained brows, 
out of keeping: they would be more in their places, I 
thought, on the armed deck of a ship, or leading men to 
battle. I could in no manner so group them as to make 
them keep tone, or preserve the harmony of the scene. 
The most favourable view that could be taken of them, 
was to regard them as wood- demons, jungle admee (wild 
men), ourang-outangs, or centaurs. The old nurse, Kama- 
lia, who, with two black slaves, brought up the rear, I 
was so convinced was a sybil or sorceress, with her attend- 
ant demons, ready to execute her horrible enchantments, 
that I began to wish myself out of the gloom of the 
forests, and to long once more to be in the sun, however 
scorching ; and when Zela pulled in her horse, and the 
old dark hag approached with her blacks, I grasped hold 
of his bridle, and urged him on, anticipating every instant 
to see Zela transformed into a white fawn, bounding into 
the density of the woods, and myself and all the others 
into great black dogs, doomed to hunt her, without pause, 
for a hundred moons. My fears were a little dissipated, 
as, clinging firmer on her horse, for its sudden motion, as 
she was looking up, had almost thrown her, she said, 
" O, let me go — I shall fall ! — and I want to speak to 
old Kamalia, to ask her what these beautiful red flowers 
are on the top of that tree. And, see ! they are not 
blossoms, but little scarlet birds, and you have frightened 
them all away ! " 

I, laughingly, acquainted Zela with my thoughts. She 
laughed too, and inquired — 

" But what do you think I am?" 

" You, dear, are the gentle Ariel, the fairy sprite of the 



218 ADVENTURES OF 

place. This wood should be your dwelling-place, your 
empire : nothing human, — for every thing human is dashed 
with evil, — should find an entrance. Elemental walls 
should incage you ; and you should live, like the bee and 
those bright birds, on the sweets of herbs and flowers." 

" Yes, but I should not wish to live alone ; nor could I 
be happy if imprisoned, though in the sweetest place, for 
then it would be no longer sweet." 

" Then, dearest, I would attend on you as your slave/' 

' c O, no, no, no, there shall be no slaves : did you not 
say so ? " 

Our path now became wider and lighter, and we emerged 
from dark shade into an open plain, almost blinding us 
with dazzling brightness. As we crossed a river, by a 
rustic bridge, I thought I recognised De Ruyter's hand in 
the construction. Again ascending a zig-zag path, we 
mounted, amongst groups of trees and shrubs, to an ele- 
vated platform, on which stood the house and gardens of 
De Ruyter. I shouted with delight to Aston^ who was 
behind me — 

" See, here it is — here is our house : it must be so; for 
who but De Ruyter would have ever discovered so match- 
less a spot to build a dwelling on ? I told you so : every 
thing we have hitherto passed is nothing in beauty to this ; 
and, possessing this, what else can a man desire ; for here 
is every beauty in nature drawn together to make it per- 
fect." 

" It is indeed!" answered Aston, looking at the situ- 
ation, and gazing round at the extensive view over the 
island, " it is perfection ! " 

"Come, come, dismount," said De Ruyter; "you'll 
have time enough to examine this. It is now the hottest 
hour of the day. Your husband," turning to Zela, " is 
fit only for a wandering santon of the desert : see, he has 
selected the most unsheltered place he could find, to have 
the full benefit of the sun. Look at him, he is unturban- 
ing ! He would be a saint among the Raypoots — the 
sun's offspring V 

Zela came up to my side, and gently said, "Do not 
stand in the sun, for it is very bad now. Look ! all the 



A YOUNGER SON. 219 

blossoms and flowers shrink from it, and, shutting their 
eyes, they sink into the shadow of the leaves; and they 
too droop despondingly. And all the pretty birds and 
insects are gone to sleep in the woods. No animal is 
stirring abroad when the sun is in the middle of heaven. 
Every thing sleeps ; even the wind is gone to sleep, in 
those holes and caverns we saw on the shore. Nothing 
but the malignant little fly is awake ; he now collects his 
venom in the poisonous exhalations, to torment the night 
with his war-cry, whilst he stabs with his lance, and 
frightens sleep away. He is the bad spirit, and sleep is 
the good. Come away ; the captain says so, and you 
mind him more than me." 

A very pretty description of the sand- fly tribe, thought 
I, as we dismounted under a viranda, and were led by 
De Ruyter into the house. It had a double row of 
Persian blinds all round, which completely excluded the 
sun, and let in the air. The centre hall, comprising 
nearly half the house, had a flag pavement, with a stream 
of the clearest w^ater, hurrying through a little channel, 
which filled an oval basin in the middle, and then a large 
bathing tank in the garden-grounds, serving also for 
irrigation. It afterwards formed a cascade, and leaped 
from crag to crag, till it reached its parent river, whose 
waters could be heard from the window, murmuring 
beneath us. De Ruyter had cut, upwards in the moun- 
tain, to the source of one of the springs, which he thus 
brought down into his house and grounds. Round the 
centre hall were low, broad, cushioned seats ; and on its 
walls Indian and European weapons of the chase, mingled 
with drawings and rustic implements. Zela and her at- 
tendants were shown into one of the wings, over which 
was written, in Persian characters, <e The Zennanah." 
Ci This was a whim of the artist," said De Ruyter, <£ who 
arranged and painted the interior ; for your lady is the 
first who, as far as I know T , ever entered it." 

Then, showing Aston his room, he turned to me, and 
continued : " As for you, a walled room cannot contain 
your wandering spirit. So we must leave you to rove 
about after your restless fashion ;— - I know you will do so, 



220 



ADVENTURES OF 



whether permitted or not. If you want any thing, clap 
your hands; then, if they are real wants, they will be 
satisfied. As to luxuries, I have avoided the taint of the 
climate ; yet nothing is prohibited, for that defeats its 
object, and sets a value on shadows. When the gong 
sounds one, you will find tiffin in the hall." 



CHAPTER XV. 



We gaze and turn away, and know not where, 
Dazzled and drunk with beauty, till the heart 
Keels with its fulness. Byrox. 



With these words he left us to ourselves, and Aston 
exclaimed, <c What can he mean by luxuries ? Can the 
world produce such as these, to my mind the most exqui- 
site that man can conceive ? " 

" I think we may contrive/' I replied, cc not being very 
fastidious in these matters, to rough it here." 

cc Yes," he rejoined; "and when we leave it, every 
thing else will appear rough and musky as an Irish hut." 

Thus chatting, strolling about the hall, and just sallying 
out, the gong sounded. All but Zela appeared. £e We 
shall find you," said De Ruyter to me, " but a droning 
sort of comrade, unless the queen bee makes her appear- 
ance ; so let her be entreated to wave the customs of her 
country, and follow ours, — at least in this. In most others 
I like hers best." 

A woman was called and sent to her. After some 
demur Zela entered, and, placing her on a couch, for she 
had never sat on a chair, I placed myself by her. Ad- 
mirable were her little tapering fingers in eating. Their 
beauty was destroyed by an ugly iron prong, which she 
essayed in vain to use. I begged her to teach me her 
way ; but, instead of separating grains of rice, as she could, 
with fingers, it was impossible to separate the rice from 



A YOUNGER SON. 2*1 

the wing of fowl in a curry. I was compelled to shovel 
them both in my mouth together. 

Zela, with still some difficulty, consented to accompany 
us in our evening stroll. She retired, and we reclined on 
the couches round the hall, with coffee and callians, gazing 
on the water, which, in its shadowed channel, looked like 
a mirror in a marble frame. Too happy to express our 
feelings, we did not talk, but sat musing, till we found 
relief in sleep. 

On awaking, we washed in basins placed on stone 
benches by the stream. A drink was brought, of iced 
water, with the compressed juice of the freshly plucked 
pomegranate ; and a little fllagreed basket of fruit and 
sweetmeats. Then again restoring the fine tone of the 
palate with coffee, whose fragrance filled the hall, we once 
more smoked our callians, till the sun was sinking behind 
a mountain, and the breeze came from the sea, when we 
sent for Zela. 

At her appearance we went into the grounds about the 
house, and ascended, by a gentle acclivity, in shaded and 
embowered paths, to a summer-room exactly of the form 
and colour of a marquee. Here was a commanding view 
of the principal beauties of the island, the sea, and the 
entire port of Bourbon, Zela cried out, (< There is the 
ship ! — close below us, — not more than five miles off! " 
And, with the telescope, I fancied I could see Louis le 
Grand busily handling the turtle, under the awning on 
deck. 

I sat down on a projecting crag, above a deep chasm, 
with my eyes riveted on the light and winged movements 
of Zela, who was flitting about, like a bee or bird, from 
tree to flower, examining nicely into each scent and quality. 
Elegant motion, graceful bearing, and bashful yet unem- 
barrassed address, are to be found in perfection in the East. 
Nature, as if fearing the rivalry of art, or indignant at its 
presumption, or disdaining to contend with so feeble a foe, 
or disgusted that her choicest, best gifts are despised, 
tortured, and distorted into unseemly shapes in what is 
called civilised communities, has withdrawn from populous 
cities to the desert and the lonely mountains, her own 



922 ADVENTURES OF 

loved haunts ; and there she dwells, sporting with her 
favoured offspring, the ring-dove, the antelope, and the 
barb. A child of the desert is like a vine in the wilder- 
ness, spreading its leafy tendrils in profusion ; although, 
in comparison to the same plant cultivated and pruned, it 
yields hut a scanty vintage, it is more beautiful, hanging 
in flowing ringlets on the heads of forest trees, than clipped 
and confined to hedge- stakes. The vine and the olive are 
children of the hills and sands, nurtured by sunbeams. 
The desert-horse and antelope are the fleetest and most 
beautiful. That majestic king of birds, the plumage of 
which waves over the jewelled diadems of human kings, 
and nods in triumph over a royal hearse, inhabits the 
sandy wastes. The richest fruits, the sweetest flowers, the 
balmiest air, the brightest and purest water, are found 
amidst rocks and sands, nursed in solitude and liberty : 
and there man communes with God and nature till, in love 
and worship, his feelings are almost divine. There, too, 
I have seen her virgins — and Zela was one of these — 
untaught as her wildest children, whose exquisite loveliness 
shamed the Grecian sculptor's art, his measured lines and 
cold proportions, by beauties such as inspiration, with the 
perfection of science, could never dream to trace. I have 
gazed on their forms, features, and expression, blending 
and harmonising together, till the over-excited senses, all 
concentrated into one, have so fascinated my being, that I 
have become faint with unendurable delight, and my heart, 
overflowing with its delicious sensations, sought relief in 
sighs and tears v What eye so stony, that meets their 
arrowy glance darting through the brain, could scrutinise 
its colour or measure its lines, to see if it were of the 
Grecian or Roman mould ? The owl might as well at- 
tempt to gaze undazzled at the sun. 

It was only in Zela's absence that I could dwell on her 
portraiture. She had just turned her fourteenth year ; 
and though certainly not considered, even in the East, as 
matured, yet, forced like a flower, fanned by the sultry 
west wind, into early development, her form, like its petals 
bursting through the bud, gave promise of the rarest 
beauty and sweetness. Nurtured in the shade, her hue 



A YOUNGER SON. 223 

was pale ; but, contrasted with the date- coloured women 
about her, the soft and transparent clearness of her com- 
plexion was striking ; and it was heightened by clouds of 
the darkest hair. She looked like a solitary star unveiled 
in the night. The breadth and depth of her clear and 
smooth forehead were partly hidden by the even silky line 
from which the hair arose, fell over in rich profusion, and 
added to its brightness; as did the glossy, well-defined 
eye-brow, boldly crossing the forehead, slightly waved at 
the outer extremities, but not arched. Her eyes were full, 
even for an orientalist, but neither sparkling nor promi- 
nent ; soft as the thrush's. It was only when moved by 
joy, surprise, or sorrow, that the star-like iris dilated and 
glistened, and then its effect was most eloquent and ma- 
gical. The distinct ebon-lashes which curtained them were 
singularly long and beautiful _; and when she slept, they 
pressed against her pale cheeks, and were arched up- 
wards. 

That portion of the eye generally of a pearly white- 
ness in hers was tinted with a light shade of blue, like 
the bloom on a purple grape, or the sky seen through the 
morning mist. Her mouth was harmony and love ; her 
face was small and oval, with a wavy outline of ineffable 
grace descending to her smooth and unruffled neck, thence 
swelling at her bosom, which was high, and just developing 
into form. Her limbs were long, full, and rounded ; her 
motion was quick, but not springy — light as a zephyr. As 
she then stood canopied beneath the dense shade of that 
sacred Hindoo tree, with its drooping foliage hanging in 
clusters round her, in every clasped and sensitive leaf of 
which a fairy is said to dwell, I fancied she was their 
queen, and must have dropped from one of the leaves, to 
gambol and wanton among the flowers below. Running 
to her, I caught her in my arms, and said, " I watched 
your fall, and have you now, dear sprite, and will keep 
you here V — pressing her to my bosom. 

iC Oh, put me down ! You hurt me, — - 1 have not fallen, 
— oh, let me go ! " 

Ci Will you promise then not to take flight to your leafy 
dwelling, in that your fairy kingdom tree ? " 



224 ADVENTURES OF 

" What do you mean ? Oh ! let me go, — you '11 crush 
me !" 

I gently placed her on the ground,, and told her my 
fears. The instant I unclutched her, she ran to her old 
attendant, scared like a young leveret ; and this was my 
first emhrace of my Arab maid. 

That it may not be considered I exaggerate, when speak- 
ing of the Arabs in India generally, I must refer the 
reader to what a recent, learned, and unprejudiced tra- 
veller says of them : ei The Arabs are numerous in India ; 
their comparative fairness, their fine, bony, and muscular 
figures, their noble countenances, and picturesque dress, 
intelligent, bold, and active," &c. 

Zela's father was all this, and her mother a celebrated 
beauty brought from the Georgian Caucasus, and twice 
made captive by the chance of war. After giving birth to 
Zela, she looked, and saw her own image in her child, 
blessed it, and yielded up her mortality. Is it to be mar- 
velled at, that the offspring of such parents was as I have 
described, or rather what I have attempted to describe ? 
For I am little skilled in words, or words are insufficient 
to represent what the eye sees, and the heart feels. 



CHAPTER XVI. 

There 's not a breath 
Will mingle kindly with the meadow air, 
Till it has panted round and stolen a share' 
Of passion from the heart. Keats. 

On my return to De Ruyter and Aston, they were de- 
termining on the necessity of our calling on the command- 
ant at Port St. Louis, and agreed to ride thither on the 
ensuing day. I begged off, under plea of having the ship's 
duty to attend to. We continued in the open air till 
supper was announced, and our evening terminated as 
agreeably as the day had begun, wanting nothing but the 



A YOUNGER SON. 22 S 

presence of Zela. As we were to rise long before the sun, 
to enjoy the cool morning air, we retired early to our 
couches. 

My restless spirit could not be hushed to sleep. After 
tossing about for an hour, I returned to the summer-house, 
where they found me in the morning. I then went to the 
bath, which refreshed me more than sleep. After coffee, 
and smoking our callians, we went round with De Ruyter 
to look at his plants and shrubs, which he had brought 
from different islands in the Indian archipelago ; for he 
had a strong passion for gardening, building, and planting, 
and loved this island for its climate and soil, where every 
thing flourished. He said, ee I have questioned all sorts 
of people, up to princes and tyrants, and find that gar- 
deners are the most contented, and, therefore, the happiest 
people in the world. I confess, if I had not been a sailor 
from chance, I should have been a gardener from choice. 
But we have no voice in these matters, compelled, like the 
beetle and the bat, blindly on, in the earth, or in the air." 

I could hardly remember a fruit or flower I had ever 
seen in Europe or India which he had not collected to- 
gether here ; and there were many I had never seen, or 
never taken note of before, besides the aboriginal trees of 
the island. Except the platform on which the house was 
built, all the ground round about was wild and broken. 
The timber found on the spot had been partially cleared 
away; small groups and single forest trees were left. The 
house consisted of a single story, with a projecting front 
and roof, and was colonnaded. The front was to the 
south, and looked down on a small plain ; the sea was to 
the north-west ; and to the east, mountains, forests, rocks, 
and precipices, diversified the scenery. With the exception 
of a portion of the plain below, nothing indicated culti- 
vation or inhabitants. There was a large plantation, with 
several small ones, divided by avenues of trees and paths 
between, and whitewashed wooden cottages, whence De 
lluyter drew all his supplies, making it a point to produce 
every article he consumed in abundanee, 

" It would be more advantageous," said he, ec in a 
worldly point of view, to cultivate that alone, in large 
Q 



226 ADVENTURES GP 

quantities, which is best adapted to the peculiarity of the 
soil; and, by turning the overplus into specie, to purchase 
what necessaries or luxuries I might fancy. But, besides 
the satisfaction I feel in my plan, for what I lose in profit 
I gain in pleasure, health, and occupation, it enables me 
to meliorate the hard fate of those suffering under a de- 
testable system, — which I abhor, but cannot remedy, — I 
mean that of slavery. What I could, I have done. You 
will find no slave on my property. The bread you eat 
may not be the whitest or the lightest ; but it is not stained 
by the blood and sweat of the galled and overtoiled cap- 
tive, or leavened in execrations. Some score of slaves that 
I have redeemed, or found free, are my tenants. I have 
a tithe of their produce ; I take it in kind. One is to 
supply me annually with corn, another with coffee, and so 
on to rice, sugar, spices, cotton, tobacco, wine, oil, spirit, 
and what else the ground will produce. What is super- 
fluous I dispose of. Every thing you eat and drink here 
is by free, not by forced, labour; and I think we shall not 
relish our homely fare the less from knowing it is so. I 
am not one of those heavy-beamed moralists who preach, 
but hang astern from practice ; fellows who scrutinise into 
the doctrine of a tailor before they venture into a pair of 
breeches of his making, without a thought of payment ; I 
rather look at the goodness of their work, than at their 
godliness. I am better served by free people, working 
with all their hearts, than by the hands of heartless 
slaves/' 

The ride to the commandant being postponed to the 
following day, we all proceeded to employ ourselves after 
our own fancies. Be Ruyter made a drawing of a wing 
he wished to add to his dwelling, as a zennanah for the 
women. Aston unearthed sweet potatoes, yams, and herbs 
for dinner. I formed an arbour of bamboos amidst the 
shrubs, where I planted the mystic tree, the yakoonoo, 
that caused Zela's tears to flow on our journey. As 1 lay 
down under the shade of a rose-apple, not having slept at 
night, I fell into a sound nap ; from which I was awakened 
by feeling, as the sun ascended over the trees, the rays 
stealing up my limbs like flame. I knew I should be 



A YOUNGER SON. 22? 

burnt out of my post in a few minutes ; yet this enhanced 
the pleasure of those moments, and I contentedly endured 
the fiery martyrdom of my lower extremities. At this 
moment I heard a gentle rustling noise approaching. What 
could it be ? I was stretched out in such listless indo- 
lence, that I could neither move nor look, though I con- 
tinued to listen intently. I felt I ought to rouse myself, 
for as it came on, it struck me it was a serpent ; but then 
I instantly recollected that De Ruyter told us there was 
not a single venomous reptile on the island. Oh no, 
thought I, I know the sound ; I am confident it is only a 
lizard or two, fly-catching. Then I was conscious of 
something being lightly placed above me, which rustled in 
its motion ; and, opening my eyes, I beheld Zela, with her 
little Malayan girl, Adoo, shadowing me with part of a 
tslypot palm -leaf, — for an entire one is sometimes thirty 
feet in circumference. She was running away when she 
perceived me awake ; but I caught hold of the hem of her 
loose, embroidered trousers. iC Why," said she, ee do you 
lie in the sun ? Don't you knew it is worse than the bite 
of the chichta ? — and its blow on the uncovered brow 
more fatal than the bahr's ? " 

u Sweet Zela, what brought you here ? " 

iC Oh, to gather fruit." 

" Why did you bring that palm-leaf? There's none 
of them near this place/' 

Her eye then caught the tree I had planted, and she 
asked, u What do you think for ? How could I know 
you were sleeping in the sun ? We got the leaf to cover 
this yakoonoo." 

(e How did you know it was planted there, for I told no 
one of it ? " 

I thought I read in her eyes, and in the varying ex- 
pression of her features, the mirror of her mind, that I 
was not, as heretofore, indifferent to her. With a step 
almost as light as hers, I returned with her to the house. 



q2 



22S ADVENTURES OP 



CHAPTER XVII. 

Sublime tobacco ! which, from east to west, 

Cheers the tar's labour, or the Turkman's rest ; 

Which on the Moslem's ottoman divides 

His hours, and rivals opium and his brides ; 

Magnificent in Stamboul, but less grand, 

Though not less loved in Wapping, or the Strand ; 

Divine in hookahs, glorious in a pipe, 

When tipped with amber, mellow, rich, and ripe. Byron. 

And on the sand would I make signs to range 

These woofs, as they were woven of my thought ; 

Clear, elemental shapes, whose smallest change 

A subtler language within language wrought. Shelley. 

We were met by De Ruyter, who said, " Lady, I was about 
to pay you a visit, for a cup of old KamahVs coffee." 

" I beseech you do, captain/' she answered ; " she makes 
it better than any one ; her sherbet, too, and her arekee are 
excellent. She knows many other things ; and can read 
the old books of our country, and the stars." 

(C By her antique look," observed De Ruyter, " she must 
have studied from the papyrus ; and it would not surprise 
me if she could clear up the mystery of hieroglyphics." 

On entering the zennanah, the old governante, Kamalia, 
having counted us on her four skinny fingers, proceeded to 
fulfil that sacred rite, never omitted in the East, of pre- 
senting refreshments ; without the heartless and niggardly 
ceremony of appealing to the guests, as is wont in Europe, 
to learn whether they will take them or not, looking on 
those who receive them with an evil eye. I followed 
Kamalia to know how the genuine oriental coffee is made. 
Good Mussulmans can alone make good coffee ; for, being 
interdicted from the use of ardent spirits, their palate is 
more exquisite and their relish greater. 

Thus it is : — A bright charcoal fire was burning in a 
small stove. She first took, for four persons, four handsful 
of the small, pale, Mocha berry, little bigger than barley. 
These had been carefully picked and cleaned. She put them 
into an iron vessel, where, with admirable quickness and 
dexterity, they were roasted till their colour was somewhat 



A YOUNGER SON. 229 

darkened, and the moisture not exhaled. The over-roasted 
ones were picked out, and the remainder, while very hot, 
put into a large wooden mortar, where they were instantly 
pounded by another woman. This done, Kamalia passed 
the powder through a camel's hair cloth ; and then repassed 
it through a finer cloth. Meanwhile a coffee-pot, contain- 
ing exactly four cups of water, was boiling. This was taken 
off, one cup of water poured out, and three cups full of the 
powder, after she had ascertained its impalpability between 
her ringer and thumb, were stirred in with a stick of 
cinnamon. When replaced on the fire, on the point of 
over-boiling, it was taken off, the heel of the pot struck 
against the hob, and again put on the fire. This was re- 
peated five or six times. I forgot to mention she added a 
very minute piece of mace, not enough to make its flavour 
distinguishable ; and that the coffee-pot must be of tin, and 
uncovered, or it cannot form a thick cream on the surface, 
which it ought to do. After it was taken, for the last time, 
from the fire, the cup of water, which had been poured 
from it, was returned. It was then carried into the room, 
without being disturbed, and instantly poured into the 
cups, where it retained its rich cream at the top. 

Thus made, its fragrance filled the room, and nothing 
could be more delicious to the palate. So far from its being 
a long and tedious process, as it may appear in narrating, 
old Kamalia allowed herself only two minutes for each per- 
son ; so that from the time of her leaving the room to her 
return, no more than eight minutes had elapsed. 

Zela herself handed it to her guests, the little Malayan 
girl following with sweatmeats and water. Zela then 
brought me a cheboukche (Turkish pipe) ; it being the 
custom for the wife, in her apartment, to fill and light it, 
but only for a father or husband. She removed the pale- 
coloured amber from her ruby lips, and, presenting it to 
me, crossed her hands on her forehead. She then left me 
to see her other guests served by her women. 

Pallid amber, not transparent, tinged with the lightest 

shade of violet, or, as the Mussulmans say, like the hue of 

a fair virgin's brow just as the life has fled, is by far the 

most precious. Next to that, in their estimation, ranks the 

Q 3 



230 ADVENTURES OP 

lightest of the lemon shade, cloudless and unspotted, but 
not transparent, 

The only admissible beverage to preserve the sensibility 
of the palate, whilst inhaling the vapour of that exquisite 
and inestimable leaf, which grows at Shiraz, on an estuary, 
the eastern side of the Persian Gulf, (said to have been 
Adam's Paradise, and I believe it !) if you would volup- 
tuize in the full luxuriance of its perfect flavour, is either 
coffee, such as I have described, or the juices of fresh fruits 
compressed in water, or the pure element, or Tonkin or 
Souchong tea, gathered whilst the dew was on the leaf; 
let the best be selected, and infused with a liberal hand in 
water, the instant ere it boils, — not stewed, as in Europe* 
Just as the leaves are unfolding themselves, the infusion is 
pungent and aromatic without being bitter and vapid. It 
should then be sweetened with the clearest candied sugar. 
All fermented liquors are held in Mahometan abhorrence 
by refined smokers, as blunting the delicate sense of the 
palate, and destroying the mental relish. 

Zela's father was deeply versed in the art of smoking, 
and had initiated her theoretically in its most hidden mys- 
teries, as an indispensable part of female education ; and 
De Ruyter, little inferior in his practical knowledge, used 
to say, " I consider European accomplishments as mere 
springes to catch woodcocks. Useful knowledge they have 
none. All their pride is in their feathers and ornaments, 
like the coloured muckarunga, or the flaunting peacock, or 
the motley jay, stupid, presumptuous, and chattering. 
Whilst these Arab maids, whom they scoff at as barbarians, 
because they alone value what is useful, can manufacture 
cloth of all sorts, fashion it into dresses, sow the corn, bruise 
it, and make it into bread, hunt and spear the flying ante- 
lope, or ostrich, and cook either in a variety of modes. 
Then their plighted faith was never broken : and their 
watchful quickness and devoted courage are a shield on their 
husband's bosom, when his eyes are closed in the nest of 
danger ; for then treason or force cannot reach their lords, 
unless through their faithful breasts. As to female beauty, 
who is to decide on the general standard ? They are all 
classed together, and so are the lily and the garlic ; yet 



A YOUNGER SON. 231 

what can be more dissimilar. In Siam and Arracan long 
ears and black teeth are thought charming ; in China 
and Tartary, large lips and long nails. In some parts of 
Europe the points of beauty are considered similar to those 
of the horse, — breadth, bone, height, and solidity of struc- 
ture. In England there is an Amazonian breed arrived at 
perfection, together with the horse, the bullock, and the 
oak. But those who love dainty, delicate, and feminine 
forms, must seek them in the lands where flourish the crim- 
soned-blossomed ceiba, the date, and waving bamboo, which 
love nature's wildest nooks, and refuse to mingle their beau- 
ties with the crowded jungle or cultivated plantation." 

On the ensuing morning De Ruyter and Aston went to 
the town of St. Louis on a visit to the commandant ; and I 
amused myself in gardening. Zela was becoming accus- 
tomed to be with me, and I could hardly live a moment 
out of her presence. Her calm features became dimpled 
and animated by smiles. We were both unlearned in love. 
Though we could converse on common topics, notwith- 
standing my mistakes in the Arabic, without any great 
difficulty, yet were we equally novices in the language of 
the heart. The fierceness of my passions, which usually 
hurried me on impetuously, was now checked by the acutest 
sensibility. I could find no words to express my new 
feelings, wdnle their violence craved the perfection of elo- 
quence to delineate them. But words died on my lips ; 
and, as we sat down on a carpet, under the shade of a tree, 
we communed in the antique characters of her country, 
which, for lovers, far excel the alphabet of Cadmus. We 
drew figures, on the red sandy soil, of birds, ships, and 
houses, and to these hieroglyphics we added the mute lan- 
guage of fruits and flowers. These, with her large dark 
eyes, the sweet movement of her lips, their touch, and our 
fingers twined together as our young hearts beat tumult- 
uously, seemed to me most eloquent and intelligible. Time 
past rapidly as the little gusts of wind, flying over the 
silvery surface of the tank of water at our feet, or as they 
bent the flowers and passed on. Then we strolled about, 
and ravaged the garden of its ripest and richests fruits, 
when the greatest contention that ever passed between us 
q 4 



232 ADVENTURES OF 

was, — who culled the best ? and which was the best ? 
She grew animated in panegyrics on the fresh and luscious 
date, and 1 declared it nothing in comparison with the 
downy nectarine, and the lordly-crested pine-apple ; while 
Aston, close behind us, gave it against us both in favour 
of the mangostein, in which he contended were united the 
flavours of the nectarine, the date, and the pine-apple, in 
addition to its own. 

<f Holla ! " I exclaimed — cc Aston ! I thought you 
were gone to call on the commandant. It is too late now, 
— the sun is hot, — I feel my blood boiling. Why did 
you not go with De Ruyter ? — he has been off this hour." 

" You are dreaming," answered Aston; " De Ruyter and 
myself went off six hours ago, and here we are returned. 
It is now mid-day, and we have been seeking you every 
where. Dinner is waiting." 

" Nonsense ! Zela and I came out here while you and 
De Ruyter were drinking your coffee, and talking of going 
into town. Certainly that 's not more than an hour ago." 

iC Awake, you dreamer !" he said, " and look at the sun. 
Don't you see it has passed the south, and is now above 
your head ? Surely it must have affected your brain ! But 
come, get up ; we, who count time by our appetites and 
the calendar, want something more solid than the dainty 
food of love.'* 

Amazed at the unwonted rapidity with which the day 
had flown, we returned to the house. Zela, ignorant of all 
artifice, could only assure De Ruyter, in reply to his ban- 
tering, that she did not know it was so late, that she feared 
she had unconsciously dozed away the time, and that as we 
had eaten of so many fruits, neither of us was hungry, and 
we had never thought of dinner. 



A YOUNGER SON. 233 



CHAPTER XVIII. 

And are you really, truly, now a Turk ? 

* * * ' * * * 

Is 't true they use their fingers for a fork ? 

Well, that 's the prettiest shawl, as I 'm alive ! 

You '11 give it me ? They say you eat no pork. ' Byron. 

The commandant, I was informed, was anxious to see me, 
and had requested us all to dine with him. Aston had 
been very kindly received. 

Consequently, a few days after this, before the break of 
day, we returned by the same route by which we had 
come to the elevated plain, passed the Piton, and, by a 
tolerable road, and a very agreeable descent, arrived at the 
town of St. Louis. On this side the mountains slope as 
smoothly down to the sea, as they rise abruptly and pre- 
cipitously on the other side. The lands near the town 
were highly cultivated. Groups of pretty cottages, with 
green virandahs, were scattered about on the plantations, 
which were separated from each other by double avenues 
of trees. These were vacours, impenetrable from the 
dense mass of barbed and pointed leaves, and the beautiful 
scarlet and white blossomed rose- apple, growing in the 
form of an olive ; and under their shade was the coffee- 
tree. We saw a great variety of bananas, fields of pine- 
apple, hedged by peach-trees, Persian roses, and a beau- 
tiful Indian shrub, called netshouly ; while the willow-like 
bamboo hung his head over the clear river, as if enamoured 
of his own graceful form. 

On arriving at the town, built close to the harbour, at 
the mouth of the delightful valley through which we had 
descended, and which was overhung by a lofty mountain, 
we passed some tolerable houses in the suburbs, having 
gardens filled with fruits and flowers. We then wound 
through some narrow, dirty, unpaved streets of wooden 
and mud tenements. As we approached the harbour, near 
the quay, we came to the commandant's house, which 



234* ADVENTURES OF 

looked like a magnificent palace amidst the dwarf hovels 
around. 

The commandant received us with that urbanity and 
equality which the French so readily put on ; and which 
are so striking when compared with the dog-like surliness 
of the rude and stiff-backed Englishman in power, who 
looks at every stranger as an intruder that ought to be at- 
tacked. He swells with paltry pride, puts on the air of a 
muzzled bear, or vicious mule, and pats his dog, the em- 
blem of his master, that struggles to break his chain and 
fly at your throat, while you are growlingly asked, — 
" What *s your business, sir?" If, forcing his nature, 
he sulkily asks you to walk in, and if his wife happens to 
be caught unprepared to receive you, she reddens with 
anger, and with some gentle hint to her husband, bounces 
out of the room like a fury. Unless you find some means 
to appease her, for the whole day her temper is discom- 
posed, and you are ever after considered as an intruder ; 
or, if of high caste, she treats you with blank indiffer- 
ence. 

With our French commandant it was different; he went 
to the other extreme, and loaded us with welcomes. While 
refreshments were preparing, he took me into his lady's 
dressing-room, and saying, — " I have brought you a 
young Arab chieftain," — left us. 

She made me sit by her on the couch, and asked me all 
sorts of questions, never doubting I was not what I seemed. 
She told me I was handsome, and my shawls were hand- 
somer, wished to know if they came from Cashmire, why 
I shaved my head, if I believed in the Virgin Mary, if I 
had ever loved, and if I would be christened. Her hands 
kept pace with her tongue till she almost stripped me to 
examine my apparel. My skin, she said, was very smooth, 
not very black, and she asked if Arab women were hand- 
some, and if I liked the French women. Then she told 
me she was returning shortly to France, because she could 
no longer endure the heat, the barbarous people, the want 
of society, the want of an opera, of every necessary of 
life, — except the real ones, which she allowed were good 
and abundant, — but these she did not want. Here she 



A YOUNGER SOX. 235 

was interrupted by De Ruyter, a great favourite of hers. 
She called him the only real gentleman on the island, as 
he had passed many of his early years in France and at 
Paris. Upon which she talked unceasingly of Paris. 
{i Dear De Ruyter," she said, (i does this boy belong to 
you ? Where did you get him ? I have taken a great 
fancy to him, and positively I am determined to take him 
to Paris. Only think what a sensation he will make 
there ! Well ! it is wonderful these people, who live on 
the sands, with the lions and tigers, should have such a 
distinguished air, and carry themselves so well ! And 
then, my dear De Ruyter, only think what he will be 
when he has passed a winter in Paris, and learnt to waltz ! 
Well, you are a dear creature, — and remember you have 
given him to me. Plow beautifully he puts on his tur- 
ban, and — what is your name ? Come, show me how 
you fold your turban. Every one in Paris will be dying 
in love with — your turban and shawls/ 1 

She ran on in this style till wearied ; then vowing I 
should remain with her, and that she could not bear me 
out of her presence an instant, she threw herself on a 
couch, and pointed to me to get a punka and fan. iC Ah ! 
who would live here," she ejaculated, 6 * where the heat is 
so insufferable that a person cannot say a single w r ord of 
welcome to an old friend, without being ready to expire ! 
I declare I have not spoken three sentences this month. 
And this boy must be wearied too. You know our house, 
De Ruyter ; and do — that *s a dear creature — send some 
cf my women, — and reach me that Eau de Cologne." 

After a sumptuous tiffin, the commandant conducted us, 
together with the captain and some of the officers of the 
corvette, which was then lying in Port St. Louis, to a 
reading room, which the merchants had built for literary 
pursuits and the improvement of the island. There we 
found all the principal persons assembled, military, civil, 
and mercantile, The commandant was requested to read 
an address of thanks to the captain of the corvette, De 
Ruyter, and their officers and crews, for the important 
benefit they had effected in the extinction of the pirates at 
St. Sebastian. The French captain added that their success 



236 A3 VENTURES OP 

was to be attributed to De Ruyter's skill and intrepidity. 
The commandant then presented the two captains with 
handsome swords, and the first lieutenant of the corvette 
and myself with silver-gilt goblets, bearing inscriptions. 
The commandant, in compliance with De Ruyter's wish, 
previously made known, from delicacy to Aston and me, 
did not refer to the affair with the English frigate. 

We then separated, after a renewal of refreshments, and 
looking over the books and newspapers. On returning to 
the commandant's house, where there was to be a public 
dinner, his lady insisted on our all sleeping during the heat 
of the day ; but I made my escape, and went to look at 
the ships in the port. The beautiful American schooner 
was there, and I could have passed the day in gazing on 
her symmetry and the exquisiteness of her model ; but the 
groans of the slaves, staggering under their burdens, their 
sweaty brows, wan eyes, and galled backs covered with 
flies, drove me way. I then wandered about the town. 
Out of a population of seventeen or eighteen thousand, 
there were not more than seven or eight hundred Euro- 
peans ; and these were a motley crew of all nations ; con- 
sequently the proportion of slaves was immense. They 
were chiefly from Mosambique and Madagascar, and the 
islands scattered about. Some of them were free, and 
excellent mechanics, — very good and industrious. Most of 
them spoke French, and many spoke English. They were 
admirable accountants and linguists. I saw neither horses 
nor carts ; slaves and buffaloes were the only animals em- 
ployed ; these did all the work. I wandered about the 
suburbs, where the natives exclusively reside, went into 
their hovels, and talked with them, till I thought it time 
to return to the commandant's. 

After bathing, I dined with a large party there. The 
conversation ran principally on la grande nation, the 
pirates, and Paris ; only one of which I had seen, wished 
to see, or cared about. I remember a gawky, convex-bel- 
lied, bilious, hawking Frenchman, with a mouth as large 
and deep as a horse's, eyes yellow as topazes, no forehead, 
no complexion, no hair, with a nose like a squashed fig, 
the usual characteristics of his nation, and he asserted that 



A YOUNGER SON. 237 

London was as inferior to Paris as the black town of the 
Isle of France was to Calcutta. I was rejoiced to get 
away from these vain, gasconading harlequins, and accom- 
pany the commandant on horseback to a magnificent open 
space, planted with trees, in the outskirts of the town, 
surrounded by hills, with summer cottages of every de- 
scription. We then, to my great delight, returned to- 
wards our home, the commandant accompanying us part of 
the way. 



CHAPTER XIX. 

And, oh ! that quickening of the heart, that beat 

How much it costs us ! Yet each rising throb 

Is in its cause, as its effects, so sweet, 

That wisdom, ever on the watch to rob 

Joy of its alchemy, and to repeat 

Fine truths. Byron. 

In my impatience to be at home, I took little notice of the 
scenery. De Ruyter asking me what I thought of the 
lady, I replied, u I think her a little angel ! She is so 
gentle, of so heavenly a disposition, with such noble sen- 
timents, and high courage ! And though she is extremely 
silent, that arises from timidity and thoughtfulness ; for 
such eyes and such a mouth were never meaningless ! " 

(C Take a turn there, my lad ! — you have said enough. 
I will allow you she has all the beauty pertaining to her 
nation, — that is, youth and dress. As to all the other 
charms you have enumerated, I have not discovered the 
smallest indication of their existence, neither in her, nor 
in her nation, — and I have lived among them. What 
do you mean by timidity? — the air and carriage of a 
courtezan ! As to her thoughtfulness, you may as well 
call these noisy, screaming parrots contemplative. Then 
her extreme silence ! — I would rather he in a whirlpool, 
with a hurricane over my head, or be condemned to the 
galleys for life, than endure the torture of a French wo- 
man's tongue an hour a day in a tropical climate !*' 



238 ADVENTURES OF 

u A French woman ! " I exclaimed ; " whom do you 
mean ?" 

" Mean ! whom should I mean but the woman we have 
passed the day with ! " 

" Oh ! I had quite forgotten her ! I was talking of 
Zela!" 

" Ha ! ha ! " he replied laughing, u you are the lad 
who — 

' Wrote to his father ending with this line, 
My dearest Zela, J am ever thine I ' 

I thought you had more of the eagle's aspirations than to 
stoop so low. It is rightly called falling in love, for a 
man can fall no lower. Great spirits are never enslaved 
by so grovelling and feeble a foe. You are greedily gloat- 
ing on a poison, which will destroy all the noble feelings 
and energies of your character. You have now as inex- 
tinguishable a fire in your bosom as that which is burning 
in the dome of this mountain ; and, mark me ! it will de- 
stroy you as it will that hill, granite though it be. Poor 
boy, I pity you ! for I see you have resigned yourself, a 
willing slave, to the worst and most enervating of human 
passions. Women are like parasitical plants, casting their 
wild tendrils from one tree to another, till, swollen into 
tough cordage, they strangle those they embrace, and 
luxuriate in their decay. That broad and open forehead 
indicates a judgment, which, when matured to fulness, 
ought, with its iron grasp, to crush the reptile passion, 
soon as it has birth. Men like you are for nobler uses, 
for actions that may benefit mankind, not to be dedicated 
to the narrow, paltry, selfish views and gratifications of a 
solitary individual, however worthy. What ! devote 
yourself to the childish pastime of fondling a tawdry toy, 
a baby's doll !" Seeing me silent and sad, he ended by 
quoting his favourite authority on all questions, but, like 
all others, quoting only for his own purpose : — 

" Rouse yourself j and the weak wanton Cupid 
Shall from your neck unloose his amorous fold, 
And, like a dew-drop from the lion's mane, 
Be shook to air." 

Soon a f ter he added, by way of softening the pain his 
if unts had given me, {C I do not mean to censure you for 



A YOUNGER SON. 23Q 

loving Zela. She is your wife,, dependent on you, and 
most worthy to be loved. But I object to your exclusively 
loving her, and withdrawing your affections from others, 
together with your time and talents, which can be bene- 
ficially employed/' 

He then talked on other subjects, and endeavoured to 
awaken that interest which heretofore I had taken regard- 
ing general topics, as well as in those connected with my 
own particular duties. 

Perhaps to avoid further discussion, I spurred on a 
long way before De Kuyter. On ascending the eminence 
on which our dwelling stood, I was surprised at observing 
all the blinds and windows closed of the centre room. It 
was the cool time of the evening, the sun had dipped be- 
hind the western hill, and the sea-breeze was blowing 
freshly. I feared something was wrong, — some accident. 
As Zela was alone in my thoughts, notwithstanding De 
Ruyter's censure on love, I hastened round to the back of 
the house, forced one of the blinds, and jumped into the 
large room. The sudden transition from light to gloom 
prevented me from distinguishing any thing ; but calling 
out ce Who is there ?" a voice replied, ic Close the win- 
dow, — he will escape ! Shut the window, — they will 
escape !" 

As I advanced, I stumbled into the water channel, the 
voice still vociferating, fi Shut the window, — oh, they 
will escape ! they will escape ? " 

Recovering my footing, and looking up, a ghost-like, 
lean, and shadowy figure came towards me. I soon re- 
cognised the sound of the flabby foot on the pavement, 
and then distinguished, by the aid of a small lamp held in 
a horny hand, the light reflecting through it the unearthly 
visage of Van Scolpvelt. In his left hand he held a long 
white bamboo, which he waved like a wand, preparatory 
to an incantation. He passed without noticing me, his 
eyes strained almost out of their sockets, staring towards 
the ceiling. He shut the blinds with his wand, then kept 
waving it aloft, and muttered, " They have not escaped 
me, — there they are ! — and the air has done them good. 
They were merely somewhat vertiginous, and have re- 



240 ADVENTURES OF 

sumed their vivaciousness. Well, it is wonderful I Look 

— is that you, captain ? I thought it was one of the 
blacks, — I am glad you are come, for you will be de- 
lighted with these gay, sprightly quadrupeds, wantoning 
about in the air." 

c< What do you mean ? I see no quadrupeds. I be- 
lieve you are the devil, or you could not stand the suffo- 
cating heat of this room." 

i( Heat ! I feel no heat. Now, don't open the windows 

— you will destroy me. I shall be satisfied in a few mi- 
nutes more. Do look at them !" 

" I see them, and hear their faint cries. What are 
you at with these birds ? Are you conjuring with them 
or what ? " 

" Birds ! Humph ! I thought you must be very ig- 
norant, on account of your opposing science. Birds ! — 
they are no more birds than I am. They are viviparous 
classed in the same order of animals as yourself. You 
threw my Spallanzani away the other day, when I sent it 
you, or you would not be so ignorant as to call a bat a bird.' 

(C Come, Van, open the windows, I am sick." 

" Sick ! what consequence is that ? Am not I here ? 
I wish you to witness the success of the experiment. 
Would you not, observing their motions, conclude they 
had the use of their visual orbs ? Would you imagine 
the cornea had been burnt out ? " 

" Burnt out!" 

" Yes, this half hour." 

" What brute did it?" 

Zela, the window being now open, came in weeping, 
and said, " I am glad you are returned, — that horrid 
yellow Indian has been catching all the poor creatures he 
could, and putting out their eyes with hot needles/' 

Van, it appeared, coming to see De Kuyter, found some 
bats in the ruined wall of an old well. He had caught 
three, blinded two with a hot wire, and scooped out the 
eyes of the third. Then he let them loose in the room to 
see if they could direct their flight with the same rapidity 
and precision as before they were thus horribly deprived 
of sight. 



A YOUNGER SOX. 241 

He termed it an interesting, delightful, and satisfactory 
experiment. i( Spallanzani," said he, " essayed it on the 
common hat, but I on the vampyre and spectre species. 
To-night I will determine another question. It is asserted 
they are such admirable phlebotomists as to insinuate- their 
tongues, which are aculeated like the finest lancets, insens- 
ibly into the veins of persons asleep, using their long wings 
as a fan to soothe their slumbers, and thus extract an immense 
quantity of blood. They prefer the veins on the back of 
the neck, or on the temples. Sometimes the victim in- 
sensibly bleeds to death. Now," turning to me, C( you 
are young, heated, feverish, and your veins are large and 
full, — will you repose by the old well to-night ? I will 
regulate the quantity, and stop the after-bleeding, which 
is the only danger. Think of the advantage you will con- 
fer on science, as well as the benefit to yourself ! For, if 
it is true, cupping-glasses, leeches, and other means of 
bleeding, may be advantageously superseded by this inesti- 
mable phlebotomist. Then, in the morning, we will pro- 
ceed to the examination of the physiological construction 
of its tongue ; as that may throw some new light by which 
the lancet may be improved." 

Van warmed with the idea, and grew eloquent. I knew 
how vain it was to contend with him on these points, and 
therefore contented myself with giving him a flat denial, 
and expressing my abhorrence of what he had already 
done. Upon this he tried to coax De Ruyter and Aston 
to submit to the experiment ; but, finding them deaf, he 
put on his most whining look, and was shuffling towards 
Zela, — she ran off like a hare. Sputtering about the ig- 
norance of womankind, and the prejudice of mankind, he 
declared that he himself would have his bed by the well 
side, which he actually directed to be done. 



24>2 ADVENTURES OF 



CHAPTER XX. 



Grim reader ! did you ever see a ghost ? 

No : but you 've heard j — I understand — be dumb 

And don't regret the time you may have lost, 

For you have got that pleasure still to come. Byron, 

Aston and I vowed we would practise some trick on 
Scolpvelt, in return for his cruelty to the bats, and quickly 
decided on our operations. While De Ruyter accompanied 
him to supper, I went, with a couple of black boys, to 
survey the localities of the well. It was built in the 
eastern manner, broad and deep, with steps leading to the 
bottom. With difficulty I descended, the steps being 
broken and worn away, the sides overgrown with dark and 
rank vegetation, night-flowers, and creepers, and towards 
the bottom blackened and clogged with the dung of bats, 
and slippery from the slime of toads, which raised a hoarse 
and discordant clamour as I thrust a bamboo down to try 
the depth of the water. Satisfied there were only two or 
three feet, and having partly cleared the bushes away, I 
ascended and made my arrangements. A cot of De Ruy- 
ter's having been brought, we placed it with the head to- 
wards the steps of the well, passed a rope through the 
rings at the two ends, and then a loose lashing round it, 
to haul-taut when he had turned in. A large pepul-tree 
grew near, with one of its branches crossing the mouth of 
the well, and darkening it with its dense foliage. On this 
bough a block was lashed, and the rope rove through it. 
Having instructed the boys in the parts they were to play, 
I returned to the house to equip them properly. 

As I entered the room to call De Ruyter away, it 
having been agreed that Aston was to be left to entertain 
Van till he chose to retire to his berth, I could not refrain 
tarrying an instant in admiration of his discourse. " I 
wish/' he exclaimed, " my mother had not brought me 
into the world, or that I had been born a thousand years 
antecedent to this dark age, in which I behold the sun 



A YOUNGER SON. 243 

setting on science. Had men been wise, had they en- 
couraged it to the utmost, it would progressively have 
advanced, till it ascended above the dark clouds enve- 
loping us, and the chemist, with his galvanic battery, 
would be no longer destroying, but creating. New planets 
with immortal beings might then by science have been 
created, as by science they have been created out of pre- 
existing matter. Oh ! my mother, had you lived to this 
dark period, when I cannot find a man rational enough to 
sleep by a well ! You, my mother, who loved and 
honoured nothing but science, and me, your only child, 
for my devotion to it, you knew how long and ardently 
the Scolpvelts had pursued their god-like profession : and 
when, from intense study, your eye became diseased, and 
I told you it would end in cancer, if not removed, you 
said, — f My son, remove it/ On the instant I did so, 
and she uttered not a groan, but leant back unconfined in 
her arm-chair, smiling approbation at my unshaken 
nerves ! " Then exultingly he added, — " And where 
will you find such a woman now ?" 

He lit his ecume de mer, offended at our laughter, 
which he at all times abhorred, and went and laid himself 
down in his cot by the well. Aston had promised to give 
a look to Van every hour. 

We now proceeded to fit the black boys for their parts. 
De Ruyter mixed up some chenam and lime, with which 
he drew lines on their bodies, leaving the form of a skele- 
ton distinctly marked out, — a white one on a black 
ground. This, together with Malayan bows, covered with 
blackened paper streaked with white, and attached to their 
backs as wings, gave them a complete spectral appearance. 
We then armed them with small needles, bound together 
with thread, leaving a minute portion of their points bare, 
and separated from each other, such as sailors use for tat- 
tooing their skins. 

A little after midnight, Aston and De Ruyter placed 
themselves at the end of the tackle, to be hoisted at a 
given signal ; I crawled, unperceived, under the pepul- 
tree ; and the spectre-boys occupied stations among the 
bushes on each side of the cot. There were actually seve- 
r 2 



244 ADVENTURES OF 

ral of the dusky, monstrous, obscure bats flitting round and 
round the well, while others were attached by their long 
thin claws to the branches of the pepul, hanging with 
their heads downward, immediately over Scolpvelt, who 
lay on his back, and seemed anxiously watching them. 
He looked like an ancient mummy partially unrolled. He 
was furnished with a bandage to stop the bleeding, when 
he should, in quality of physician, cry — " Hold, enough ! " 
When I gave the signal, the boys rose from the bushes 
with a shrill cry, flapped their skeleton wings, enclosed 
him in the flaps of the cot, and hauled the lashing taut in 
an instant. The signal to hoist was then made, and Van 
ascended. I bore the cot over the mouth of the well, and 
made the signal to lower away. The boys, playing all 
sorts of antics, caught hold of the rope, jumped on the 
cot, and pricked Van all over with needles, thickly as the 
stings of a swarm of wild wasps. Meanwhile the cot was 
lowered as fast as possible, when the bats, disturbed in 
their haunts, sprung out in multitudes, flapping their 
wings in disorder ; and the toads and rats, of which there 
was an abundance, increased the din. When the cot was 
landed at the bottom of the well, and the boys had cast off 
the rope, and cut the lashing, we ran them up. We then 
all joined in the shrill cry of the American Indians, by 
screaming and patting the mouth with the hand, at which 
the affrighted inhabitants of the well, undisturbed for cen- 
turies, beasts, birds, and all the tribe of reptiles and ver- 
min, burst from their dark abodes, appalled at the unwonted 
summons. 

To us, who were only looking down, it was a fearful 
sight ; to Van at the bottom it must have appeared hor- 
rible. We began to repent of our frolic ; but De Ruyter 
said, C( No, he has the heart of a stoic. Either his phi- 
losophy, or his fear, or both, — for they are not, though 
thev ought to be, incompatible, — prevent his calling for 

aid/* 

u Hush ! " I whispered, (C I hear his fin going in the 
water. He is moving, — and hark ! his croak rises above 
the toad's." 

We heard him muttering and stumbling about, groping 



A YOUNGER SON. 245 

his way ; then a splash in the water, as if he had slipped 
his fin and undergone a ducking. Satisfied he was in no 
immediate danger, but wishing to punish him for his bar- 
barity, we left him till the expiration of the hour. Aston 
then went, feigned surprise at not finding him, and walked 
about the garden hallooing his name. I, who had fol- 
lowed, heard him floundering in the water, cursing the 
Lour in which his mother had brought him into the world, 
the island, the bats, the well, and all the devils in it, in 
Dutch, Latin, and English. At last Aston deigned to 
hear him ; and, after allowing some time to elapse, we 
proceeded with ropes and lights to release him. A boy, 
lowered into the well, lashed a rope round his body, and 
we ran him up to the pepul-bough with such force that 
his trowsers and shirt were torn ; and he looked like a 
felon hung in chains, with his rags fluttering in the wind. 
When lowered on the ground, he was too exhausted to ar- 
ticulate. The resurrection of Lazarus conveys but a faint 
idea of him as he stood before us, with our lanthorns 
thrust in his face. His head shook as if palsied, his thin 
legs knocked together like bamboos in a gale, his skin was 
stained with bat's dung and green slime, his face was of a 
clay-cold blue, mottled with spots of blood, and his long 
thin hair hung down like a mermaid's. With grizzled 
eyebrows standing right out, he was sullen and snarling as 
a jackall entrapped. Not a word was uttered in reply to 
our incessant interrogatories, as we followed him to the 
house. He scowled malignantly at me, as I persecuted 
him with questions respecting the vampyres, how they got 
him down into the well, and if they had bled him. A 
tumbler of skedam, a dry shirt, and a bed, were prepared 
for him in the hall. He sullenly and silently lay down. 



b 3 



2-i>6 ADVENTURES OF 



CHAPTER XXI. 

When snouted wild boars routing tender corn 

Anger our huntsman. Keats. 

On the morrow Aston and I took our boar-spears, and as- 
cended the woody part of the mountain. After wandering 
for some time, we followed the course of a small stream, 
almost consumed by the long drought. Its scanty waters 
laboured in tortuous windings under the shade of trees and 
shrubs, which, still verdant from the moisture, in grateful 
homage bent over their feeble nurse, paying their tribute 
of shade. The burning sun, like fire, seemed to be de- 
stroying all around. The hardy oak and lofty pine, the 
giant palm and the majestic teak, rising like chieftains 
above the forest, with scorched and seared heads, appeared 
drooping in anguish. Their shrivelled and red-spotted 
foliage, and withered fruits, dropped from their sapless 
branches, without a breath of air to move them, and 
cracked under our feet. The noisy parrot tribe was 
stilled ; and the restless monkeys, half-dozing in listless 
apathy, hung on the branches, and let us pass unnoticed ; 
or, if I awakened their attention by casting my spear or a 
stone, slowly and sullenly they ascended a few feet higher, 
or merely shifted their posts to the other side. No other 
animal was to be seen. Yet, with the nerve and sinew of 
youth, health, and strength, we seemed sun-proof, as we 
bounded along, regardless of all impediments of bush, 
bamboo, or briar, clearing the path with our spears, and 
forcing a passage, like the wild-boar which we were seek- 
ing, and only reminded by our appetites of the approaching 
hour of noon. 

Then, crossing the streamlet, we descended towards the 
house, when we were surprised at the report of a musquet 
close to us, loud as a cannon, owing to the stillness around, 
and echoing from rock to rock. In an instant the wood 
was in an uproar with its alarmed inhabitants. As we 
hastened to the spot whence the gun was fired, a wild 



A YOUNGER SON. 247 

sow burst out of the hollow trunk of a broken tree, fol- 
lowed by her litter of young, rilling up the concert with 
their most sweet voices. Aston and I gave a loud holloa, 
and sprang after them. The mother, brutish as she was, 
turned at bay, and opposed her breast to our pointed 
weapons, forgetting all but her children. I wish my good 
mother would sometimes think of hers ; it is so long since 
she gave them birth, that perhaps she may not remember 
she ever had any. In my eagerness I got before Aston, 
and heedlessly rushing on, the shaft of my spear snapped, as 
the weapon, ill-directed, glanced off from the sow's hard 
and wrinkled hide, and, the ground being dry and slippery, 
I fell before her. She gave me no pause to rise; I 
grasped the small creese in my bosom, and lost not my 
presence of mind; though her small and fiery eye, her 
wrinkled snout and huge tusks, looked terrific as she was 
dashing in on me. Aston exclaimed, — ce Lie still ! — 
don't move ! " and I felt his lance glide over me, as he 
forced it under the sow's left shoulder through the heart, 
and almost through the body, which fell dead upon me. 

Another voice then exclaimed, — e{ He'll make excellent 
hams ! I'll carry him down, and salt and cure him ! " 
upon which I found my limbs were caught hold of. 

" I'll be hanged if you do ! " I answered, as I got up, 
and confronted Louis, who had that morning arrived at 
the house with provisions. 

' ' Oh ! " said he, " I did not see two, I thought there 
was only one ! " — then stooping down, and handling the 
swine, he chuckled over it with delight, as he feasted, in 
imagination, on its carcase ; till, catching the sound of the 
little grunters, squealing and running about in quest of 
their dam, "Ah !" he cried out, iC she has little ones, — 
has she ? Why didn't you tell me that ?" 

We succeeded in catching the greater part of the litter. 
Louis fondled, kissed, and hugged them, called them his 
pretty dears, bade them not cry, promised to take as much 
care of them as their own mother had done ; and then, 
turning to us, inquired if we were hungry, and if he 
should light a fire and roast a couple of them, by way of 
tiffin, to give us an appetite for dinner. We asked him 
r 4* 



248 ADVENTURES OF 

what he had been firing at. (i Oh, I had quite forgot ! '' 
he replied ; " first let me tie these lovely little creatures, 
two and two, by the legs, and I'll show you what I've 
been shooting; — it is not dead yet." 

He led us a few paces off, under a large tree, from 
one of the horizontal branches of which was suspended a 
huge baboon. His entrails were hanging out, and the 
blood was running down in a stream, yet, in pain and 
agony, clinging with his hind feet to the branch, he mowed 
and chattered at us. Louis forthwith reloaded his long 
gun, and, as he pointed the barrel upwards, the poor brute 
seemed sensible of his impending fate. His rage gave 
way to fear ; he cast one piteous glance, made a last effort 
to move from his perilous and exposed situation, and, ere 
the gun was fired, dropped down lifeless. Louis promptly 
seized him by the nape of the neck, and cut his throat. 
It looked so like a human murder that I shuddered, and 
said, " Come along, — leave him there, — leave him !" 

" What for ? " said Louis. u I '11 not leave him ; it is 
the best eating in the world ! If you don't know that, 
you know nothing." 

c 'Bah!" said Aston, <e the fellow's a cannibal; come 
along." 

We left him, promising to send some servants to 
bring down the wild sow, and hastened down the hill, 
We found Van Scolpvelt seated under a prickly pear 
hedge ; he had a large, old, musty folio spread out before 
him, and was intently occupied in looking at something 
with a magnifying glass. He took no notice of our ap- 
proach, but resumed working with a small knife; and 
I discovered he was (still untamed in his cruelty) at what 
he termed vivisection on an unfortunate hedgehog. He 
said to Aston, with asperity, " Take a lesson here ! Look 
at this heroic little animal," (drawing his knife across 
him,) (i you see he is alive, has muscles and nerves, yet he 
neither moves nor makes a noise ! " 



A YOUNGER SON. 24fQ 



CHAPTER XXII. 

Our talk grew somewhat serious, as may be 

Talk interrupted with such raillery 

As mocks itself, because it cannot scorn 

The thoughts it would extinguish. Shelley. 

A lovely being scarcely formed or moulded, 

A rose with all its sweetest leaves yet folded. Byron. 

Entering the house, we saw De Ruyter busy with his 
books and journals. He asked me to look over the ship's 
books and letters ; when my attention was called off by a 
discussion between Aston and De Ruyter. The former 
was urging the latter to publish some journals he had 
written, and permitted us to read. I was struck with 
De Ruyter' s reply. " If," said he, ei I were ambitious of 
an immortal name, and had genius enough to insure it by 
writing, I would not write. Action, when pure, bright, 
and unsullied, is the nobler sort of immortality ; and 
writing, unless our actions correspond with it, is to be re- 
membered but as Seneca's. How few of the ancient Greek 
and Roman heroes were authors, yet how many live to us 
in their deeds. iEschylus, Sophocles, and Homer are 
read; but Socrates, Timoleon, Leonidas, Brutus, Portia 
and Aria are known. Signal actions of heroism, devotion, 
and generosity have saved them from oblivion. Immor- 
tality, conferred by action, is fully as honourable, and 
infinitely more universal than that conferred by writing. 
For millions are incapable of comprehending the ideas of a 
great author, who are warmed and made to glow at the 
narration of a noble or generous deed. Content, during 
my life, to be thought well of by those I love ; to 
the world in general, now and hereafter, I am indifferent. 
I value your good opinion beyond the approbation of the 
French government. They have written me here that 
you are to be — (but it is a, general order) — imprisoned 
until exchanged. But I selfishly inclined to live in your 
good opinion^ give you your liberty unconditionally ; and 



250 ADVENTURES OF 

will procure you a passage to one of your ports, when you 
grow tired of our dull life here." 

" If I am to wait till then/' answered Aston, "it 
will never be ; for, till the present period, I have hardly 
ever enjoyed rational pleasure, or felt a delight in my ex- 
istence, such as I now feel. I am perfectly content here ; 
I have not a wish ungratifled ; and my happiness would 
be complete, but from the uncertainty of its duration. 
So that I must candidly confess my lips would belie my 
heart, if I thank you for this news." 

" Then spare your thanks, and stay where you are," he 
said, getting up and wringing his hand. "Stay where 
you are, and leave the rest to me. I will manage the 
commandant ; and from what you have told me of your 
affairs, it cannot injure you in your own service." 

iC Curse the service I" said Aston, as De Ruyter went 
out of the room* " I was a silly boy when I entered it, 
and have been a besotted fool to continue in it, till I am 
unfitted for any rational pursuit, by which I might earn 
my bread. I have been in it from ten years old till now 
that I am five-and-twenty, never three months on shore, 
my skin nearly burnt black by the sun, and my hair 
grizzled with storms ; this, with a sprinkling of scars, 
occasional rheumatic twitches, and the rank of lieutenant, 
is all I have yet got, or am likely to get." 

ec Yes," I added, u you will get a snug berth in Green- 
wich Hospital, — a nice little cabin there, six feet by five, 
all to yourself, with grubbery, free of rent and taxes, a 
cabbage-garden to ruralise in, and three half-pence a day 
— backee money ! What can man wish more ? " 

Aston went on bewailing his hard destiny, and I dosing 
him with consolation derived from the hospital. However, 
it ended with my persuading him to continue for some 
time where he was, and to wait for an opportunity of our 
putting him on board one of the country vessels, or of 
landing him on the coast near one of the English settle- 
ments. I must confess I often urged him, with all the 
warmth of my character, and my friendship for him, to 
relinquish a service where he was hopeless of promotion, 
and, as he was destitute of fortune, to join with us ; by 



A YOUNGER SON. 251 

which means he would, after a few years, in ail probability, 
be enabled to return to his own country, or to any other, 
with the means of enjoying — his sole ambition — a country 
life. <( For," I continued, u a man without money has no 
country. Besides, Aston, you are a Canadian born ; and 
if you go to England without money, remember there are 
certain unsightly boards at the entrances of the towns, 
neatly painted, and swung gibbet- fashion, intimating some 
awkward, ungentlemanly sort of hint to persons without 
money ; something to this effect — Vagrants are not ad- 
mitted here. So that Greenwich — " Here he stopped 
me, by taking down a boar- spear, and I jumped out of 
the window. 

Nor would he ever seriously listen to my propositions on 
this subject ; he was not to be moved. As to De Ruyter, 
I believe he never thought of such a thing ; though he 
and Aston were firm and inseparable friends. 

I went down to the port where the grab lay, paid the 
men a considerable share of prize-money, and discharged 
the greater number, merely leaving sufficient to take care 
of her, under the command of the good old Rais. I made 
an arrangement with him that I should go on board the 
grab twice a week, and that he should come up to us on 
two or three of the other days. Thus, having settled 
every thing regarding her, I gave up mind, body, hearty 
and soul to the full enjoyment of our rural life. Nearly 
every day I explored the island in some new direction, 
discovered where game most abounded, and in what rivers 
and lakes were the finest fish, sometimes with De Ruyter, 
at other times with Aston. On good sporting days we all 
went together, taking provisions with us, and dining in 
the woods ; when Louis, who had little to do on board, 
was our caterer. When the weather was favourable for 
working in the garden we were occupied there ; when it 
was wet or stormy we fenced, read, wrote, or employed 
ourselves in drawing. We w r ent as seldom as possible to 
the town, notwithstanding the almost daily solicitations 
from the commandant's lady, officers, and merchants. De 
Ruyter, and indeed all of us_, hated what is called society. 
He had therefore chosen a place for his house, well nigh 



252 ADVENTURES OF 

inaccessible during the rainy season ; thus artfully avoid- 
ing intrusion on his solitude by frivolous, idle, and 
troublesome visitors, such as swarm in every garrisoned 
town, quoting the words of the French philosopher, 
Morin, " Those that come to see me, do me honour ; and 
those that stay away, do me a favour." When some of 
them did venture, their whole discourse was about the 
perils they had passed in fording rivers and swamps ; 
while De Ruyter provokingly pointed out with what 
facility it might be remedied, and talked, after his next 
voyage, of looking to it. But when they had left us, he 
would say, cc I wonder how they managed to get here so 
easily. We must dam the water up to increase the swamp 
and the torrent, and add to the vibration of the bamboo- 
bridge." 

Yet he was no churl. All worthy men were welcome ; 
he himself would be their guide ; and, as the door flew 
open at their approach, he clasped their hands, and every 
feature in his face expressed how heartily they were 
welcome. He felt, and he made them feel, that their 
acceptance of his hospitality was a proof of their great 
friendship for him. The longer they stayed, the more 
he was obliged ; and if they left him before their affairs 
compelled them to be gone, his brow darkened with un- 
quiet thoughts. In few houses where I have lived, 
(married men's, of course, out of the question,) did every 
guest, as well as the host, enjoy so much liberty as in 
De Ruyter's. If fellows, calling themselves gentlemen, 
resembled him, they would require no slang dialect, no 
polish to their boots, or starch to their shirts, to point 
them out. 

My little orphan bride, thank heaven ! knew nothing of 
civilisation. Her shyness was that of the wood-pigeon, 
not the coquette's. She, poor simple thing, thought her 
husband alone should dwell in her thoughts ; and imagined 
not that fashion had made that a crime in my country, 
more heinous than adultery. The circumstances of our 
first meeting, our ship-life, then our dwelling together in 
scenes formed for love, perfected in a few months what 
years would have, perhaps, been too short for in ordinary 



A YOUNGER SOX. 253 

situations. Besides, the custom of her country was in 
our favour, where courtship is wisely dispensed with. I 
say wisely, because, while youth and beauty are wooed, 
judgment is blinded by passion. In the east these matters 
are better contrived ; the process is summary ; parents, 
whose judgments are matured, and whose passions are 
withered, conclude the necessary preliminaries ; and the 
bride and bridegroom meet, and are married in the same 
hour. c< For/' said the old Rais, and he was wise, 
<e young men and women are like fire and gunpowder; 
they should therefore be carefully kept apart from each 
other, as on board the grab." It is notorious that, in 
Europe, diplomatic mothers know how much, for their 
own interest, is to be effected by dress and address, 
importunity and opportunity, with young persons. There 
the unmarried talk of domestic happiness and conjugal 
affection ; at which, I have observed, the married wince, 
as the horse does under the torture of the firing iron; — 
some, indeed, with heads as hard as rams, and hides wife- 
proof, endure the yoke with magnanimity. It is in the 
east that wedded love reigns triumphant; where the 
unmarried alone are the poor, the houseless, and the 
despised. 

Zela, though young, was familiar with death ; and as 
grief for her lost parent faded, her affections were re- 
awakened by me, their only claimant, and mine were all 
dedicated to her. I taught her my language, and learnt 
more of hers, — it was all she knew. Our breath mingled 
as I bent over her, our lips met, and our hearts beat 
together. She was an apt scholar, though her only punish- 
ment for idleness or neglect was the infliction of kisses, 
which were so long and ardent, that our lips seemed to 
grow together. She became the companion of my rambles, 
and, with a light hunting spear, followed me through the 
woods, and up the mountains. Her fairy form was endued 
with wonderful strength and agility. If stopped by a 
torrent, or a rugged ravine, I bore her in my arms; and, 
m the jungles, cleared the path before her. Our happiness 
could admit of no augmentation ; it was perfect. In these 
our halcyon days, we thought no more of what others 



254 ADVENTURES OP 

were about in the world, than of what was doing in the 
rnoon or stars. Those who dwelt with us occupied the 
small portion of our thoughts and affections, which could 
be spared from our deep and overwhelming devotion to 
each other ; and Aston always, and afterwards De Ruyter, 
sympathised with our feelings, and glowed with admiration 
at witnessing such strange and matchless love. 



CHAPTER XXIII. 

Rapt in the fond forgetfulness of life, 

Neuha, the South Sea girl, was all a wife ; 

"With no distracting world to call her off 

From love ; with no society to scoff 

At the new transient flame ; no babbling crowd 

Of coxcombry in admiration loud, 

Ofc with adulterous whisper, to alloy 

Her duty, and her glory, and her joy. Byron. 

We had now been some months luxuriating in a tranquil 
life, little disturbed or marked by events worth recording, 
every moment of which lives fresh in my memory, when 
De Ruyter received intelligence that determined him to 
prepare for sea. His spirit knew no pause when an object 
was to be obtained. His mind, like a lens, concentrated 
its power into one piercing ray. From the instant he 
arrived on shore he had doffed his sea-garb, put on that of 
a planter, and with it the character. They both sat on 
him so well that a stranger would have thought he never 
had worn any other. Horticulture and agriculture, pruning 
and planting, exclusively occupied him, hand and heart. 
He never went down to the port, detested the smell of tar, 
said the sight of the sea made him qualmish, and cursed 
the sea-breeze for uprooting his sugar-canes, and destroy- 
ing his young plantations. He interdicted the use of 
nautical phrases, and forbade salt junk to be brought into 
his house. 

So that one day, when he hailed me from the balcony, 



A YOUNGER SON. 255 

as I was at work in the garden, with — " Holloa ! my 
lad, — heave ahead ! — you're wanted ! " I threw down 
my spade and entered the house, ready to tax him with 
his sea-slang. But I was stopped, on entering the room, 
by observing the floor covered with charts, a case of in- 
struments lying open, and himself kneeling and measuring 
distances with a scale and compasses. The tall spare 
form of the Arab Rais leaned over him, pointing with a 
sea-bleached hand to a group of islands in the Mosambique 
channel. As De Ruyter was too intently occupied to 
perceive me, I looked for a while, first at one, and then at 
the other. The hazy film which hung on his eyes when 
he was calm had evaporated, and they sparkled; all his 
face was lighted up, and its muscles in motion. I then 
looked at the Rais ; but his features were as little subject 
to change as a ship's head, stained with tar and tempests ; 
his face was like an antique sun-dial, with its surface 
corroded and effaced, no longer marking the passing hour. 
" Ha I my boy," said De Ruyter, " we must be stirring. 
Order out our cattle. We must go down to the port." 

He then rose up, took off his white jacket, and shipped 
a blue one. I asked no questions, but followed his ex- 
ample, and off we started. His little acheenian pony kept 
not pace with his rider's impatience. u Come," he said, 
" let us leave these ambling stumbling brutes, only fit for 
monks, and cross the hills on foot by the compass." 

We gave them to a servant, climbed the hills, and made 
our path as straight, and our flight almost as rapid, as the 
crane's. Arrived at the port, we pushed off in a canoe. 
The instant he was on board of the grab, he resumed his 
command with a stamp on the deck, when the idle Arabs, 
who were listlessly lying in the sun, jumped up, and all 
was life and motion. As he went about giving orders, 
the new masts, spars, and sails, which had been preparing, 
were now completing. The copper bottom of the vessel 
was careened ; the elongated bow was unshipped ; the 
upper works lowered ; and the grab was about to be con- 
verted into a corvette. 

When De Ruyter had instructed me in what he wished 
to be done, he went on shore with the Rais, and crossed 



%56 



ADVENTURES OF 



the land to Port St. Louis, to recruit his crew, complete 
his stores, and arrange his other affairs. Immediately it 
was known he wanted volunteers, sailors of all countries, 
and all sorts of adventurers, flocked to him. His name 
was enough; every man shipped for a cruise with him 
thought his fortune made ; and, instead of slinking about 
to avoid his creditors, he was again to be found carousing 
and brawling in wine-shops, and lolling on shop-boards 
and benches. The hollow in his cheek was again filled 
with a quid, and his inconstant womankind now his con- 
stant companion. But De Ruyter was fastidious in the 
selection of men, particularly of Europeans, whom indeed 
he employed as sparingly as he could, knowing the diffi- 
culty of governing such lawless outcasts, and left the old 
Rais in charge to make up the number of his crew from 
Arabs, and various natives of India, which, in the crowded 
port of this island, was no great difficulty. 

Meantime we worked hard, day and night, on board 
the grab, — as I shall still designate her, for she under- 
went many transformations. In a few days, from looking 
like a floating hulk, she became like a winged thing of life ; 
and, in a few days more, like a ship of war. We painted 
her sides of different colours, one entirely black, the other 
with a broad white streak. 

De Ruyter had given me to understand that he should 
proceed to sea alone. He also informed me of the design 
he had in view ; which was, to intercept some English 
vessels in the Mosambique channel; and that he should 
not be absent more than a month or six weeks. Ci In the 
meantime," he said, "you can amuse yourself in over- 
looking the plantations, and completing the improvements 
we were about. You seem so perfectly happy here, are 
become such a good planter, and there are so many things 
that require a master's eye, that it is better, since one of 
us must remain, that it should be your lot. Besides, 
Aston must not be left alone. On my return, I have 
more important designs in view. We will then refit, and 
all embark ; when we can put Aston ashore in one of the 
English settlements." 

These and other reasons induced me willingly to con* 



A YOUNGER SON. 257 

sent ; and when De Ruyter had completed his water and 
provisions, we had a carouse on board the grab, shook 
hands, and parted. He weighed with the land-wind ; 
and in the morning, at break of day, from a height, which 
Aston and I had ascended, we saw her dark hull and white 
canvass skimming the water like an albatross. 

I continued the same sort of active, yet quiet and happy- 
life. My love for Zela knew no diminution. Every day 
I discovered some new quality to admire in her. She 
was my inseparable companion. I could hardly endure 
her out of my sight an instant ; and our bliss was as per- 
fect as it was uninterrupted. My love was too deep to 
fear satiety ; nor did ever my imagination wander from 
her, to compare her with any other woman. She had 
wound herself about my heart till she became a part of 
me. Our extreme youth, ardent nature, and solitude, had 
wrought our feeling of affection towards each other to an 
intensity that perhaps was never equalled, assuredly never 
surpassed. I went to the town only when affairs called 
me thither, or to visit the commandant, with whom De 
Ruyter had pointed out it was necessary to keep on a 
friendly footing. His lady, wdio was really a good creature, 
preserved her liking for me, and wished me much to put 
Zela under her tuition ; that she might be instructed in, 
what this lady called, the rules of civilised society, de- 
claring she would be a gem of the first water, if set and 
polished. Little as I had seen of polished and accom- 
plished ladies, that little was enough to disgust me. Even 
in their extreme youth their beauties are soiled by the 
pawing and officious hands of dancing masters, music 
masters, and French masters, whose breath is the essence 
of garlic. Then, when properly drilled, and the necessity 
of hypocrisy and lying inculcated by their mothers and 
governesses, they are thrust into the stream (not a crystal 
one) of fashionable life, rudely stared on, and examined, 
point by point, by those, exclusively denominated gentle- 
men, who earn the title from doing little but drinking and 
gambling. If the girl has money, some sinking gamester 
seizes on the occasion to keep himself afloat by marrying 
her ; if she is poor, some old lechers, their dormant pas- 



258 ADVENTURES OP 

sions rekindled^ beset her; and if she escapes either of 
these snares, a season or two of fashionable dissipation, 
day-beds, fetid air, nightly waltzes and quadrilles, rob her 
of youth ; when, with a mind tainted by vicious converse, 
her rose-coloured cheeks now yellow, her bosom collapsed 
like an ancient matron's, she could not, had she lived in 
the most degraded places, have suffered more, or gained 
less, from her bringing up and bringing out. Something 
I had already seen of this, which determined me, from the 
first, to leave Zela wild and unreclaimed as she came from 
the deserts ; and I carried my dread of any innovation 
in her country's customs so far that, had cannabalism 
been one of them, I do not think I should have permitted 
her to change it. 



CHAPTER XXIV. 

A sail ! — a sail ! — a promised prize to hope ! 

Her nation — flag — how speaks the telescope ? 

She walks the waters like a thing of life, 

And seems to dare the elements to strife. 

Who would not brave the battle-fire — the wreck, 

To move the monarch of her peopled deck ? Byron. 

De Ruyter had been absent little more than five weeks, 
when I was aroused, before the day, by a messenger, 
with news of the grab's lying at anchor in Port St. Louis. 
I sprang from my couch, asked no questions of the mes- 
senger, but hurried through the gloomy wood, ascended 
the Piton du Milieu with the fleetness of a roebuck, re- 
gardless of falls and broken bones. When on the height 
over the port, there still was not light enough to distinguish 
the vessels : I could see only a confused mass of hulls and 
masts. I hastened on. The morning gun announced the 
daylight, when, running up a high bank, I saw the grab's 
dark, long, low hull, and her masts towering above all 
the other ships. She was lying outside the harbour; she 
was in the act of hoisting her flag. A cable's length astern 



A YOUNGER SON. 259 

of her, my eye caught the beautiful American schooner, 
floating buoyantly on the short and breaking sea (for it 
had been blowing freshly during the night), like a sea gull. 
What could she be doing there? She had left the Mauritius 
for Manilla, and then to return to Europe. I was the 
more astonished at observing her hoisting a French flag, 
and an English ensign unfolding itself beneath. What 
could it mean ? Certainly she had come in with De 
Ruyter. I descended the bank, and my pace was not 
slackened by this first excitement. I thought I should 
never arrive at the port; and, when there, I was in despair 
at the few minutes which elapsed ere I could get a boat to 
take me on board. I passed one of the grab's boats going 
on shore, but would not delay an instant in speaking her. 
I seized hold of the stroke-oar, and pulled as if each stroke 
was for my life. The clear and deep voice of De Ruyter 
struck my ear, and in an instant our hands were clasped 
together. His left hand was suspended in a sling : I 
pointed to it, not having yet recovered my breath. He 
smiled, and, in return, pointed to the schooner. 

" What do you mean ?" I exclaimed. 

ec Come down, my lad, and I'll tell you. After 
cruizing some time on the northern coast of the Mosam- 
bique channel, I received intelligence of an English 
frigate's having run into Mocha in a gale of wind. To 
avoid her, I stretched over to the Amaranti islands, be- 
tween them and the amber shoal, during a tempestuous 
night. I observed, or rather I imagined, for amidst 
the lightning it was difficult to distinguish them, blue lights 
and signal rockets to leeward. I kept my wind as well as 
I could, thinking it might possibly be the frigate. Towards 
daylight the wind lulled, and I soon after discovered, to my 
great surprise, as well as joy, a sail on our lee- quarter, cer- 
tainly not the frigate. She was to the northward and east- 
ward; and, as we had been standing to the eastward, I could 
only make out she was a fore-and-aft, and not a square- 
rigged vessel. I got my top-gallant masts up ? and bore 
down to make her out better. We neared her fast, for 
she was lying to, having, as it afterwards appeared, been 
s 2 



2f)0 ADVENTURES OP 

struck by lightning, with the head of her foremast badly 
wounded. As we neared her, I discovered, by her hull 
and raking masts (for who that has once seen can mistake 
her?) our Boston schooner. Now, doubly anxious to get 
to her aid, I buried the grab's lean bow in the still heavy 
swell, by crowding canvass on her, till I thought I should 
have been dismasted too. The puny spars bent like bam- 
boos, and the kiar backstays, strong and elastic as they are, 
snapped like cast iron — not from having too much wind, 
but too little. On showing my flag, I observed some 
commotion on board of her, and marvelled at seeing her 
soon after, despite of her crippled state, making sail, and 
bearing up. You know the grab's point of sailing is not 
before the wind ; nor is the schooner s, luckily. However, 
she got her square-sail up, and, with her immense main-sail, 
she seemed to hold her ground with us. In this juncture , 
a man at the mast-head called out, e Another strange 
sail to leeward ! ' Pondering on what this could mean, 
I saw the Boston schooner's main-sail jib; and, as she 
broached to, the head of her foremast went by the board. 
I pressed more sail on the grab ; and ere she could clear, 
or rather cut away the wreck, which soon after floated past 
us, I was within gunshot of her. I then fired my bow- 
chaser, but without shot, to make her show her colours ; 
but she did not show them till a second, with shot, was 
fired over her and a third into her. The mystery was then 
explained by her showing an English ensign. She had 
been captured by the frigate which was to leeward of her. 
They had been separated by the gale during the night. 
There was no time to lose. The frigate, though a long 
way to leeward, was in sight; yet it was probable, from 
her great distance, and from our being smaller objects than 
she was, that she had not yet seen us. The courage of 
Englishmen is not to be subdued, under whatever cir- 
cumstances they are encountered. Having cleared herself 
of the wreck of the foremast, she bore down on her 
consort, and kept up a fire on us with every gun she 
could get to bear. Soon alongside of her, I was com- 
pelled to give her several broadsides; and, keeping to 
leeward of her, we cut off all possibility of escape. She 



A YOUNGER SON. 9,Q\ 

then struck, and I took possession of her. I found she had 
been " 

u But/' I said, (( you have not yet told me what loss 
you suffered, and what is the matter with your arm." 

6C We had one man killed, two wounded, and my fin 
shattered by a splinter/' 

" Not much damaged, I hope ? " 

" Oh, no;— nothing." 

" What ! " said my old friend Van, who came into the 
cabin with plaster and scissors, ec what do you call nothing? 
I, that have practised for nearly half a century, never 
saw a worse contused wound. Were not two out of the 
three digital branches of the ulnar artery lacerated ? — the 
bone denuded under the flexor profundus of the mid 
finger ? — the first phalanx of the index finger shattered, 
even to the socket of the metacarpal ? " 

fi Bah ! " said De Buyter, " a feeler or two smashed and 
jammed together." 

" Yes," answered Van, looking at me with triumph, 
and then with complacency on the swollen and disfigured 
hand, which, having unbandaged, he laid on the table, and 
examined: — "had I not amputated that index finger, 
and removed every particle of splintered bone, — had you 
been under any other surgeon's hand than mine, — you 
would not have lost a mere finger, but the entire hand 
up to the wrist. And now you call it nothing ! But 
wounds are nothing, when I am by to heal them ; — such 
is my art! I operate so gently" (applying a strong 
wash of blue stone), ci that my patients are more inclined 
to sleep than groan." 

Perceiving that De Buyter winced, I said, " Yes, 
Scolpvelt, you torture your patients into insensibility." 

Without noticing this, he watched De Buyter, and 
said, " I feel pleasure that you feel pain." 

** The devil you do!" 

" Oh, yes ! I am delighted ; for it shows that the sen- 
sibility of the part is restored. I also observe that tie 
muscle is granulating. Now we have only to use foment- 
ations to subdue the swelling, and keep down the proud 
flesh with lunar caustic. It will soon be well." 
s 3 



262 ADVENTURES OF 

I greeted old Louis, who inquired kindly after the turtle 
he had left with Zela ; and, while breakfast was preparing, 
I went on deck to shake hands with the Rais, and my 
old shipmates. 



CHAPTER XXV. 

Ay, we like the ocean patriarch ream, 

Or only know on land the Tartar's home 

My tent on shore, my galley on the sea, 

Are more than cities and serais to me j 

Across the desert, or before the gale, 

Bound where thou wilt, my barb ! or glide my prow ! 

But be the star that guides the wanderer, thou ! 

Thou, my Zuleika ! Byron. 

After breakfast De Ruyter related the conclusion of his 
cruise. He found that all but five of the Americans, who 
were ill of the fever, had been removed on board the 
frigate; that seventeen men, with two junior officers of 
the frigate, had been put on board of her, with orders to 
keep company ; but, as has been mentioned, she was 
separated in the squall. " I sent these men on board the 
grab," said De Ruyter, cc replaced them with a strong party 
of my best, took her in tow, and set about repairing her 
damage with some of our spars. The frigate chased us, 
and kept in sight two days, till I got among the Amaranti 
islands. There (for I knew them well, which they did 
not) I baffled her by anchoring, during the night, under 
the lee of one of them. I saw no more of the frigate, 
put a jury-mast in the schooner, and here I am, my boy. 

<c Now take a boat, and go on board of her ; let us 
work into the harbour; or — stop — you had better 
remain in the grab, — the wind is dying away. I must go 
on shore. Do you moor them close together in our old 
berth. I '11 return in two or three hours. I must go and 
talk to the commandant, get our prisoners landed, and see 
the merchants to whom the Boston was consigned. 
Though taken by the English, she was not yet con~ 



A YOUNGER SON. 263 

demxied by them when I retook her; so I suppose T am 
only entitled to salvage on her and her cargo ; — hut that 
will be a heavy one." 

This news a little damped my pleasure ; for I had 
regarded the prize as ours, and doubted not having the 
command of her, to obtain which was the climax of my 
most aspiring wishes, and certainly I should have preferred 
her to a dukedom. From our first meeting her at sea, 
and especially when I afterwards examined her in port, I 
had viewed her with a longing and jealous eye. The 
apparent impossibility of possessing her made me covet 
her the more. I would not only have sacrificed my birth- 
right, but a joint of my body to boot, with all I had in 
the world, except what was alone more estimable — Zela, — 
to obtain her. De Ruyter had often bantered me on this ; 
and now that my wish seemed within my grasp, I could 
not comprehend his law of salvage. He had possession, 
and that was the only law I considered just or rational. 

I awaited his return with impatience, but when he came, 
my impatience was left unsatisfied ; for he was to meet the 
merchants in the evening. Next day brought the same 
story, and so on for many days. I loathe the tardy 
transactions of these grovelling serpents. I hate arith- 
metical calculations; they do more mischief than earth- 
quakes in destroying badly founded fabrics ; they are like 
a Mameluke's bit to a fiery and impatient horse. I was, 
however, like the horse, compelled to submission. 

Much time was thus wantonly wasted, ere De Ruyter 
had concluded arrangements to pay, instead of receiving, 
certain sums, and give securities, and enter into certain 
bonds, and sign deeds, all preliminary to retaining pos- 
session of the schooner. However, it was accomplished ; 
and, in less than a month after his arrival, I was installed 
in my heart's desire. Aided by De Ruyter, I set about 
refitting the schooner for sea. Whilst at work on board, 
Zela stayed with me, . We all made occasional holidays 
at the villa, which was left in charge of Aston. 

When the grab and schooner were ready for sea, De 
Ruyter gave me his instructions. In company we weighed 
our anchors. De Ruyter had pretty well recovered the 
s 4 



26l« AITVENTURES OF 

use of his hand. The Americans, who had been left on 
board, and the four English sailors, taken with Aston, 
had entered voluntarily to serve on board the schooner. 
My crew had. been completed by De Ruyter, and was a 
tolerably good one. I was armed with six twelve pound 
carronades, and four long six pounders. We had pro- 
visions and water for ten weeks. Zela, whom nothing but 
force could have induced to remain behind, and that I 
had no inclination to essay, was with me. 

Thus, with all my wishes gratified, my joy was 
boundless as the element on which I floated; and I 
thought it would be as everlasting, — thanks to my being 
no arithmetician, and not being gifted with the prescience 
even of an hour. Accursed foresight ! which turns enjoy- 
ment into misery by calculating on what is to ensue ! I 
never did so; but went to sea with an exulting heart, 
fearless and free as the lion, when he leaves his lair in 
the jungles to hunt on the plains. 

We steered to the northward, intending to make the 
island of St. Brandon, thence to a group called the Six 
Islands, and cruise in the northern Indian Ocean, crossing 
the track of the vessels which run from Madras to Bombay 
in the south-west monsoon. The first days were passed in 
trying our respective rate of sailing, and getting the vessels 
in their best trim. The grab beat every thing in India, 
except, indeed, dead before the wind; with a heavy 
swell, nothing hitherto had any chance with her but the 
schooner. We now found, on repeated experiments, that, 
in short tacks, we could beat her close on a wind ; but in 
every other point of sailing she had the advantage, though 
so small as still to leave a doubt about it. 

We ran by the island of St. Brandon without meeting 
with any particular event. Shortly after, I gave chase to 
a brig, which I brought to. She proved to be French, 
from the island of Diego Garcia, bound to the Mauritius. 
Her captain told us he was employed in running to and 
from that island, for fish and fresh turtle, which abounded 
in its vicinity. It was uninhabited ; but some merchants 
had sent him with a party of slaves thither : while taking 
in his cargo, an English ship of war had nearly surprised 



A YOUNGER SON. 2uO 

him ; and, though he escaped, the slaves and his cargo 
had fallen into their hands. 

When De Ruyter heard this, we consulted with the 
captain on the possibility of recovering the slaves and 
cargo. De Ruyter, who was as fertile in plans as daring 
in execution, soon determined on a stratagem to be carried 
into effect by him and me. The brig, not being a very 
crack sailer, he recommended to go into a port, which he 
pointed out by his chart, in one of the Six Islands, which 
had previously been agreed upon as our rendezvous, in case 
of separation. This arranged, we made all sail, running 
down, with a rattling trade wind, to Diego Garcia. The 
form of this island is that of a crescent, containing, within 
its band, a very small island, which, serving as a break- 
water, afforded a spacious and secure harbour behind. On 
making the island, and observing the frigate at anchor 
there, we, in running down on the land, kept the little 
island between us and her, which prevented our being 
seen. We there anchored; and the next day getting under 
weigh together, the grab ran down to leeward, disguised 
like a slave ship, and appeared at the mouth of the har- 
bour, as if ignorant of there being any vessel there ; till, 
opening the frigate, which instantly got sight of her, she 
wore round, and made sail, as if to escape. 

The frigate, under the prompt and rapid hands of 
English sailors, slipped her cable, and made sail in chase. 
Yet time enough elapsed to give the grab a good offing, 
and time for me to keep out of sight, by working up to 
windward. I had landed a man on the little island, to 
make signals of the frigate's motions, and timed it so well, 
that, as she shut in the port, by rounding the projecting 
angle of the island, I weathered the extreme point of the 
little island, ran into the bay, hove to close to the shore, 
and landed with a strong party of men. 

The contrivance was so well managed, and so rapid, 
that I surprised a party of the frigate's men, with the 
slaves in custody, and others employed in cutting wood. 
We embarked the slaves, and as much fish which had 
been cured, and turtle, as we could during the four hours 
I ventured to lie there. The remainder we destroyed. 



266 



ADVENTURES OF 



As to my countrymen, their case seemed so vexaticusly 
hard, — I left them; yet not before I made them declare 
I was the best fellow in the world, — but then I had made 
them all drunk. Besides, I had cheated them, hoisting 
yankee colours, and they knew the schooner must be of 
that country ; so that, instead of escaping to the woods 
and hills, by running a hundred yards, they had awaited 
our landing without suspicion, discussing the amount of 
anticipated prize-money, and disappointed at having been 
left by the frigate, when in pursuit of a flying Frenchman, 
as they were certain the strange sail was, by her leanness 
and fleetness. We parted such good friends that, as I 
left the shore, they gave me three cheers, in return fcr 
three bottles of rum I left with them. 



CHAPTER XXVI. 

No dread of death, if with us die our foes, 

Save that it seems even duller than repose ; 

Come when it will, we snatch the life of life 

When lost — what recks it — by disease or strife ? Byron. 

I then rounded the northern point of the island, and, 
with a flowing sheet, scudded gallantly along towards the 
port where we had engaged to meet; nothing doubting 
the success of De Ruyter's stratagem to draw the frigate off, 
and, after dogging her about to give me time, to escape in 
the gloom of night. 

The weather had been hazy, with violent squalls of 
wind and rain, which was a favourable circumstance. We 
had a speedy run down to the destined islands ; and the 
grab and schooner almost simultaneously appeared to the 
north and west, as entering the channel between the centre 
of the cluster. We anchored together in a small but 
secure port, sheltered from the winds, as well as from 
observation, by a high and projecting bank stretching into 
the sea, in the form of a bent arm. 



A YOUNGER SON. 26*7 

Next morning the brig made her appearance off the 
island; and soon after came to an anchor. I left De Ruyter 
to settle the business he came about, respecting the return 
of the slaves, and went on shore. I remember nothing 
particular of the natives, except that they were a simple- 
hearted, hospitable people, chiefly fishermen. We pro- 
cured goats, fish, fowls, and vegetables; and then took 
our departure, standing towards the Mai dive Islands, to get 
on the Malabar coast before the north-east monsoon, which 
was approaching, should set in. 

We soon after boarded and plundered several vessels, 
naving English papers. Among these there was one with 
a Dutch frow on board, whose beam was nearly as large 
as the vessel's. She had a considerable investment of goods 
belonging to herself, with which she was trading, between 
Madras and Bombay, on her own bottom. Her late hus- 
band had been in the employment of the English Company, 
which was enough for me to condemn her as lawful prize. 
After culling out some of the most valuable portion of the 
cargo, and throwing overboard the most worthless, I recol- 
lected we were in want of water. There were five or six 
butts of that element on her deck. While I was waiting 
to get out the long boat to send them on board the schooner, 
the Dutch monster of a woman was smiling, ogling, and 
coaxing me to come down in her cabin, praying and en- 
treating I would not take the water. <c It is infernally 
hot," said I, cc and I want water. Hand a bucket here ! M 
(catching hold of a half empty cask.) 

u Oh, that's not good," quoth the oily frow; "here, 
boy, get some water out of the cabin. Oh, don't drink 
that, captain ! I'll get you some wine, — Constantia, 
from the Cape itself !" 

" Come/' I ordered one of the men, <e knock out the 
bung from this cask." 

One was trying to wrench it out with his knife, and 
the Dutch woman was entreating him to broach one of 
the others, declaring that to be brackish. ei How comes 
it then, you old frow, abroach ? I think you've got Con- 
stantia here ! If so, I'll take it on board." 

I seized on a crow-bar, and forced out the bung, mar- 



268 ADVENTURES OF 

veiling at the frow's eagerness to withhold me, and with- 
draw my attention. I really believed there was something 
uncommonly good in it, skiedam or wine, owing to her 
protestations to the contrary. The bung out, I held a 
bucket, as a man tilted over the cask; and, while the 
clear water rushed out, and while I was laughing at the 
beldam's pertinacity, she gave a scream, and I a shout 
of surprise at what I first thought was some animal, but 
was soon distinguished to be the end of a pearl necklace. 
The frow's red face, as I pulled it out, and held it up to 
her, became redder than a string of cornelians, which next 
plumped into the bucket. 

" Out with the head, and start the water ! — A lucky 
prize ! Hands off, — or I TL cut them off ! Put the baubles 
into the bucket/ 

We fished out a superb haul of rings, pearls, corals, and 
cornelians, — a private spec of the Dutch frow, who, 
during the chase, had thus cunningly secreted them. 
But for my having taken a particular fancy to diving into 
that cask, not wishing to broach a full one, we should 
have missed this pearl fishery. 

We made a stricter search, but discovered nothing else. 
Giving back to the frow a ring, not one of the worst, which 
she, with an oath, assured me was her grandame's, together 
with a kiss, as I placed it on her fat, stubby finger, I 
said, " Don't grieve, my young frow; for this is a 
marriage contract in the Arab country, and you 're my 
wife. When we meet again I'll consummate the rite, and, 
till then, take care of your dower." 

I then shoved off to the grab, putting the plunder on 
board her, as we had little stowage on board the schooner. 
I told Louis of the affair with his countrywoman, and 
added : iC She is certainly your frow, by the description 
you have given me of her, in search of you ; — the iden- 
tical woman, depend upon it." 

Louis looked grave, but presently cheered up, and said, 
— - cc My wife has no jewels, nor any rings on her fingers ; 
she gave her wedding-ring for a bottle of skiedam, the 
first time I refused her a dollar to buy one. 



A YOUNGER SON. 26'9 

We fell in with a fleet of country vessels from Ceylon 
and Pondicherry, convoyed by a Company's brig of war. 
De Ruyter telegraphed me to bring to, and examine the 
vessels, while he gave chase to the Company's cruiser. I 
soon came up with the country craft; they were of all 
sorts, shapes, and rigs, — snows, grabs, padamas, The 
Company's vessels, discovering us to be enemies, made sail, 
and left them to shift for themselves. As soon as I was 
near enough to get a gun to bear, I fired a shot amongst 
them, when they separated like a flight of wild ducks, driv- 
ing away in the direction of every point of the compass ; 
while I pursued them as the beneta does the flying fish, 
and kept them as well together, by running round them, 
as a huntsman, or rather a whipper-in, controls a pack of 
hounds. Some few, indeed, gave me the slip ; but I got 
the main body together. We boarded them successively, 
with little for our pains ; they were principally loaded with 
bumbalow, paddy, beetle-nut, ghee, pepper, arrack, and 
salt. However, there was a sprinkling of silks, muslins^ 
and a few shawls ; and, with infinite industry, I contrived 
to realise a few bags of gold mores, and rupees. 

De Ruyter was now a long way to leeward ; and by 
occasional reports of cannon, 1 knew she was keeping up 
a running fire on the brig, which seemed to be a remark- 
ably fast sailer. Leaving the small craft, I bore away, 
crowding every inch of canvass, to rejoin the grab. In 
the direction they were running there was a group of three 
rocks raising their crests high out of the water. There was 
a passage between them, and the Company's brig seemed 
making for them. Her object I could not guess at; but 
when she neared them, being much cut up in her rigging, 
and finding she had no chance of escape, she hauled her 
wind, and, after shortening sail, hove to, and commenced 
an engagement with De Ruyter. I was all on fire to be 
in it. As I approached, a signal from De Ruyter directed 
me to run to leeward of the rocks, to prevent the possibility 
of her escape ; and, judging from appearances, the grab 
had already so much the advantage of her opponent, that I 
could only have diminished my friend's glory, without 



ADVENTURES OF 



gaining any myself. But, before I could obey the signal, 
the brig had drifted on the rocks, designedly to destroy her, 
and then struck her flag. 

Instantly, in conjunction with the grab, we got all our 
boats out, boarded her, and endeavoured to tow her off. 
She was a fine vessel, armed with sixteen eighteen-pound 
carronades, and had eighty or ninety men and officers on 
board. She had not been engaged more than ten or fifteen 
minutes; yet her hull, as well as rigging, was a good 
deal cut up. She had only seven or eight men wounded, 
and one killed ; the grab had two or three wounded, and 
one killed by an accident. As he was in the chains, 
ramming down a cartridge, (the gun not having been 
sponged, and the vent stopped,) it exploded as the man was 
standing before it. The old Rais told me, in his unmoved 
way, " I looked out of the port-hole, and ordered the man, 
who was loading the gun, to take care not to carry away 
the dead eyes of the standing rigging ; — for he was too hot 
and hasty. The gun going off prevented his replying, I 
looked again; the man was no longer there; but a piece of 
his red cap, or red head, was floating on the water, I 
never saw any thing more of him." 

" It was Dan Murphy, — poor fellow I" 

<e Yes," replied the Rais ; (i he was always in a hurry, 
never attending to orders. And look at the dead eyes, 
~ he has carried them away with his foolish head." 

We secured the Europeans in the prize, took some of 
her stores and arms, put on board our sick men, with 
all the plunder we had accumulated, and draughted twenty 
men, two quarter-masters, a prize-agent, and master. 
After repairing her during that night and the ensuing day, 
(for we hove her off the rocks, without much damage, it 
being calm weather,) we sent her to the Isle of France. 
Her Lascars and native sailors, in a few days after, we 
shipped in a country vessel, giving them their liberty; with 
the exception of eight or ten, who entered with De Ruyter. 
More would have followed their example, had we wanted 
them. 



A YOUNGER SON. 271 



CHAPTER XXVII. 

But feast to-night ! —to-morrow we depart; 
Strike up the dance, the cava bowl rill high, 
Drain every drop ! — to-morrow we may die. Byron. 

De Ruyter determined on running through the straits of 
Sunda, while I was to run through the straits of Molacca, 
and procure intelligence of the English ships, conse- 
quently we separated. We were to meet, after a certain 
date, at an island near the great Island of Borneo. De 
Ruyter gave me full instructions, from which he made 
me promise not to deviate. 

He then took an affectionate leave of Aston, pressed on 
him presents of curious arms, in which Aston was an 
amateur, and both of them struggled, by indifferent words/ 
to hide their emotions. De Ruyter then laid his last 
solemn injunctions on me, kissed Zela's brow, shook hands, 
and returned on board the grab. 

We made sail, steering different courses. As soon as I 
was sufficiently near the entrance of the straits, I stood over 
on the Malay coast, which is very high and bold. Getting 
into a large bay, formed by a bite of land, I anchored in 
a secure berth, between a small island and the main. 
There I opened a communication with the natives, and 
with some difficulty procured a large and very fast pulling 
proa; which I thought was the safest way of taking 
Aston to Pulo-penang, lying at the entrance of the straits, 
and in the possession of the English. Pulling along the 
Malay shore, in one of their own fashioned canoes, I should 
neither be remarked by the natives, nor suspected, if seen, 
by the English. Thus I might land on any part of the 
island I pleased. 

Pulo-penang was purchased by the English East-India 
Company from the Malays on the opposite coast, and is 
now called Prince of Wales's Island. It is small, but 
exceedingly fertile, and very beautiful. It runs parallel 



2?2 ADVENTURES OF 

with the Malay coast, which is very high ; and the inter- 
mediate channel forms a magnificent harbour. 

Determined to accompany Aston, I manned the proa 
with six Arabs and two Malays (their arms secreted), 
with three days provisions and water. Aston and I em- 
barked; he in a white jacket and trousers, I in an Arab 
sailor's dress. We shoved off from the schooner, left in 
charge of the first mate, an American, who had been a 
second mate on board of her when she was taken. He had 
recovered from his fever, and De Ruyter had recom- 
mended him to me fervently. He was an active, intel- 
ligent fellow ; a thorough sailor, born and bred at New 
York. His name was Strong, a short, thick-set man, 
powerful as a Suffolk horse. One of my own country, 
who had been captain of the forecastle in Aston's frigate, 
was my second mate. He had all the characteristics of a 
man of war's man, taciturn, obedient, brave, and hardy. 
He had also a sailor's predilection for grog. The captain 
of the hold, his messmate, having bulled an empty rum 
cask, that is, immediately after the spirit is started, put 
in a gallon of water, there to remain, with an occasional 
roll, for twenty -four hours, when it turns out good stiff 
grog, our forecastle captain swilled too freely of this wash, 
and failed in his respect to a superior officer. The boat- 
swain, jealous of this man's better seamanship, and hating 
the deference that was paid him, was the cause of the 
man's being flogged. This disgrace preyed on his mind, 
and was the motive for gladly entering with me. Besides, 
as he argued, he had been twenty years serving the king 
in the West and East Indies, with nothing but two days' 
liberty on shore, the yellow fever, many wounds, one 
drunken bout while on duty, and a flogging. 

To return to my story, after shoving off in the proa. 
It was calm, with a sun that seared to the bone. We 
kept along the Malay shore ; and in the evening were off 
the Malay town of Prya, defended by a fort. Having 
got into conversation with some Malays in a fishing-boat, 
at night we crossed over in company with them to Penang 
river, lying to the southward of George Town, on the 
Prince of Wales's Island. As it was a run of less than 



A YOUNGER SON. 273 

two miles, Aston and I recreated ourselves with swallowing 
the delicious oysters, so celebrated on this coast. On 
attempting the river, we found our proa was too large to 
cross the bank ; so he and I landed. I directed the proa 
to go into the harbour, with some fishing-canoes, taking 
fish to town in the morning. 

We slept in a fisherman's hut. Just before daylight, 
we started for the town ; and crossed several streams, 
flowing from the mountains into the river. The hills 
were covered with magnificent timber, and our path was 
fragrant with the odour of flowers and spices ; which 
seemed ten times more exquisite to us, just landed from a 
small and crowded vessel, any thing but fragrant. Near 
the town, in the margin of the sea, was a wide extent of 
plain, of a light sandy -looking soil, as thick with pine- 
apples as the most prolific soil in England could be with 
turnips. Like boys, always hungry, we walked along, 
scooping their hearts out with our knives ; and daintily 
plucked and cast away twenty, ere we were satisfied with 
the flavour of one. 

We entered the town unquestioned, and went to a 
recently established hotel. Aston there rigged himself, 
waited on the president, and told as much of his story, 
as we had previously agreed on was necessary for him to 
know, or for us to divulge. He said he had been landed 
from an American vessel, lower down the coast, and 
brought to the town by a Malayan proa. 

The president, a military man, was very kind ; he re- 
quested him to take up his quarters in his house, till some 
man-of-war or English ship should come into port. Aston 
thought it prudent to comply ; merely requesting permis- 
sion to stay at the hotel for a day or two, till his apparel 
and other necessaries should be furnished. 

He then returned to me ; and as I was to go back to 
my proa that night, we were resolved to make a day of 
it before hand, which we forthwith commenced by a tiffin, 
and an order for a sumptuous dinner. 

Aston took this opportunity of again counselling me to 
return to the navy, and pointed out the consequences of 

T 



274 ADVENTURES OF 

my serving under an enemy's flag, urging me, at all events, 
to remain at the Isle of France, neutral, and not act 
offensively against my own countrymen. 

" When I have realised a competency," I said, <e it 
was always my intention, following our old captain's 
example, to become agriculturist : but I must first have 
money, for, you know, I am getting into years, have a 
wife, and shall have a family. Oh, I must be provident, 
and provide for them ! Now, if I were a single man, 
like you, Aston, young and thoughtless, it would be an- 
other thing." 

" Get out, you mad-headed boy. Why, the united 
ages of yourself and family would scarcely amount to the 
proper age of manhood — thirty ! " 

<( Thirty ! Whew ! A man is then old, decrepit, 
grisled like a worn out mastiff!" 

This was while we were playing at billiards. Weary of 
the game, I sauntered forth, surveyed the port, and set 
down in my memory every vessel lying there. I marked, 
too, my proa, lying astern of an Arab vessel, a little to the 
westward of the town, near a landing-place which led to a 
slip where a large country vessel had been built. Not 
thinking it prudent to attract notice, I returned to the 
tavern. We dined ; and what with sangaree before din- 
ner, craftily qualified with Madeira and claret, well bran- 
died, after dinner, I cannot affirm I was as sober as a 
parson should be, or as silent as a quaker : yet I was not 
drunk ; and to avoid being so, I proposed we should sally 
out for a " lark.'* 

When in the open air, I yaw r ed about a little wildly, 
and was taken aback now and then, by keeping too much 
in the wind's eye ; but I soon became steady. We wan- 
dered for some time through crooked streets, and among 
sun -burnt mud-huts, till we fell in with a place called 
Bamboo Square. It was an open space, with an irregular 
range of shops, sheltered all round from the sun by bam- 
boos and mats. A beating of drums and tinkling of in- 
struments led us on to a row of huts exclusively occupied 
by Nach girls. Aston was fond of music, and an ad- 



A YOUNGER SON. 2 75 

mirer of dancing- girls, whom I, as all married men should 
do, had foresworn. Besides, the smell of rancid oil, ghee, 
and garlic was not to my taste. I therefore left him, and 
strolled on to a range of shops called the Jewellers* 
Bazaar. 



CHAPTER XXVIII. 

So I drew 
My knife, and with one impulse, suddenly 
All unaware, three of their number slew, 
And grasp'd a fourth by the throat. Shelley. 

It was thronged with people, and illuminated with co- 
loured-paper lamps. I stood before one of these shed- 
built shops : it was the best, and kept by a parsee. He 
was showing a woman, who was veiled from her feet to 
her face, some ear and nose rings, nearly the circum- 
ference of a boy's hoop, and descanting on their neatness 
and elegance. When they had agreed on the price, she 
removed part of her head-drapery, and exhibited her nos- 
tril and part of her ear : the latter was almost as big and 
flat as a plate, and hung down like a sow's. The jeweller, 
placing his thumb to keep the slit in it open, suspended 
the huge ring, which looked like a chandelier. She had 
no occasion for a mirror, for, turning her head a little to- 
wards her shoulder, she pulled the lap of her ear forwards, 
and grinned with delight, showing a double row of deeply 
orange-dyed teeth, more numerous than a garden rake's, 
and as sharp-pointed. The jeweller, struck with these 
beauties, exclaimed, ce What an angel ! " 

She then asked him for a betel box. He produced four 
or five of gold, declaring that no baser metal ought to 
touch her lovely hand. They were handsomely made; 
and as it had just before crossed my mind that I should 
present some token of friendship to Aston, who had given 
t 2 



276 



ADVENTURES OF 



me his watch in the morning, I took hold of two of the 
boxes. I then weighed them in my hand, without attend- 
ing to the price he named, for I hated bargaining and 
haggling, put the boxes into the folds of my shawl round 
my loins, and gave him, without counting, what I consi- 
dered to be the value in gold mores. He counted them, 
and seeing me so free with my gold, became urgent for 
more. He declared I had only paid for one. To this I 
answered, " That's a lie \" — rolled up a leaf with chinam, 
deposited it in my mouth, and was going away. The 
jeweller called me a robber, and stretched out his hand to 
detain me. He got hold of the end of my turban, which 
was hanging down, and pulled it off. I turned round, 
and giving him a blow on the head, he fell among his glass 
jewel-boxes. A parsee never forgives a blow — who 
does ? Pie stabbed at me with a knife, or weapon of 
some sort, the moment he recovered his feet : but he was 
in his shop, and I out of it, so that by stepping back I 
avoided his weapon ; and my blood now rising, more at 
what I thought the fellow's audacity than at his endeavour 
to stab me, I seized on a jewel-box, and dashed it at his 
head. 

Several persons, both in and out of the shop, inter- 
fered in the business, and sided with the parsee. The 
row spread through the bazaar. The jeweller, with his 
head and face bleeding, and frenzied with passion, called 
me thief, robber, and vociferated to those about me (for the 
clamour had now drawn all idlers to us) to seize me, to 
take me to prison, or to kill me, if I resisted. As the 
crowd increased, many pressed about me ; and the infu- 
riated jeweller, grown desperate, made another effort to lay 
hold -of me. 

Danger perfectly restored my senses ; and I was enabled 
to rally that presence of mind with which I was gifted. 
I drew from my sash a pistol and creese, the two best 
weapons for close quarters ; but not till I had seen 
several men close to me draw their arms. Still I re- 
frained from using mine ; for, in cases of this sort, men 
will bluster, draw, and threaten, but yet hesitate to strike 



A YOUNGER SON. 277 

an armed and resolute man, ready to oppose them ; but 
the instant a blow is struck, all strike, when the weaker 
party must fall, unless by the intervention of some unfore- 
seen event, some lucky chance. In this momentary pause, 
on which hung my fate, as by a hair, my eye glanced 
round, and I saw the impossibility of escape in the front, 
which was crowded. To be killed on the spot was pre- 
ferable to being detained and made a prisoner. I seized 
the only outlet of escape, by retreating into the den of my 
enemy, the jeweller — not to solicit his mercy. My move- 
ments were so rapid, that those in the shop could not 
oppose me ; I stabbed one, struck the jeweller down, and 
forced away, suddenly exerting my utmost strength, the 
two upright bamboos, which supported his tent-like shed. 
Down the roof fell between me and the people, and I 
escaped into a narrow and obscure passage at the back of 
the bazaar. 

The deep guttural curses of the Malays, and the par- 
see's loud threats of vengeance, reached my ear. It was 
better to retreat than brave the fury of incensed numbers ; 
not forgetting who I was, and the consequences of being 
discovered. Had I been wise, I should have immediately 
retreated to the outside of the port, where my proa lay, 
and embarked ; but the desire of seeing and taking leave 
of Aston withheld me. I therefore cautiously threaded 
the crooked and dingy passage, which led from the bazaar, 
surprised at not being pursued. Nevertheless I hurried 
on ; and to avoid being recognised, made alterations in my 
dress. There was much difficulty, through a labyrinth of 
dark lanes, in finding the tavern, which was near the port. 

I entered and reached my room unnoticed ; but was 
annoyed at Aston's not having returned. Thinking it 
possible he might be concerned in the fray, I determined 
on changing my dress and seeing him. I put on a white 
jacket and trousers belonging to him, and could not for- 
bear smiling, as I went out of the house, at the man who 
had attended us at dinner, when I saw him puzzled to 
conjecture who I was. But that triumphant smile, I had 
afterwards reason to believe, betrayed me. 

I proceeded directly to the bazaar. There I saw Aston's 
t 3 



278 ADVENTURES OF 

tall figure, a head and shoulders above the crowds which 
which was still before the jeweller's door, — or rather, on 
the threshold, for it was all door now, an empty space. 
But I observed the crowd did not consist of the same 
persons, but of sepoys and police officers. Aston and one 
of the officers seemed listening to an account of the affair. 
The jeweller, haggard and ghastly, stood before them, 
narrating his injuries. Several of his family and friends 
were about him. He pointed to the place where his shop 
had stood, now a gap in the bazaar, stamped on the roof, 
as low as the foundation, and, as he finished his vehement 
discourse, tore the turban from his head, and rent his 
robes to fragments. And then, without heeding those who 
addressed him, he disappeared. 



CHAPTER XXIX. 

Cry a reward to him who shall first bring 

News of that vanished Arabian. Keats' MS. 

To avoid observation, and not wishing to be questioned, I 
went back to the tavern. Aston soon joined me, and, 
shaking my hand, said, " I am glad to find you here. 
There has been a serious row in the bazaar, and I feared 
you might have been concerned in it." 

ei What was it ?" I inquired*. 

" I was drawn to the spot, by seeing the people run 
that way. There was a shop, or shed, belonging to a 
goldsmith, pulled down, when the mob began to plunder 
it, while himself and a few others attempted to defend his 
property. But all the scoundrels from the port were there, 
and I don't think they have left the poor fellow a gold 
more. It was too late when I arrived there, nor had I 
my sword with me ; but I did what I could. I knocked 
down some of the fellows, and procured the sepoy guard 
from the gates." 

" But how did it originate ? " 



A YOUNGER SON. 2 79 

" With an Arab ; and, as far as I can understand, it is 
no unfrequent occurrence here, though seldom done so 
openly. The bazaar was full of people, and while the 
jeweller was showing some valuable trinkets to a woman, 
who is supposed to be an accomplice, an Arab came, seized 
every thing he could lay his hands on, stabbed one of the 
men in the shop, knocked the jeweller down, and, assisted 
by others on the outside, rushed through the shop, which 
was then torn down, and a set of miscreants commenced 
plundering.' ' 

" Do they suspect any one in particular ? " 

ec I don't know : they have some of the thieves in cus- 
tody." 

Ci Come, light your sharoot, and I '11 tell you all 
about it." 

His surprise was great at hearing I was the person de- 
nominated the Arab robber ; and, in much grief, he cen- 
sured my folly and rashness. " Besides," he added, ie the 
jeweller said he could recognise the man who first attacked 
him amidst a thousand; and, casting from him the few 
things he had saved, swore by his religion he would fast 
till he was revenged." 

te If he keeps his word," I answered, ci his rhamadan 
may last for ever ; for I shall go to sea with, the lafod- 
wind." 

But, as the devil willed it, the weather was so bad 1 
could not embark that night. I had no reason, however, 
to imagine that I was, or could be, suspected; especially in 
a town where brawls were common events, and where a 
man, dead or missing, was of little account, amidst a po- 
pulation of armed and blood-thirsty Malays (who, of all 
eastern nations, and all human beings except kings, hold 
human life in least respect,) and Arabs, with whom, if 
precedents and time can make a thing lawful, killing is no 
murder, and robbery no crime, for they are coeval with 
their race. Besides, the parsee's brother was not dead. 

Aston went early in the morning to the president ; and 

I went out, taking the precaution to wear an arrican cap 

instead of a turban, and loitered down to the port to glean 

information. Afterwards I visited the shops to purchase 

t 4 



280 ADVENTURES OF 

some trifling things I wanted ; besides which, I had several 
important commissions to execute for De Ruyter, in pro- 
curing information, and forwarding letters to the interior 
of Hindostan. This I did through an agent of the French 
government, which had spies, I believe, in every port in 
India. Once or twice during the forenoon I thought I 
was watched, and evaded my imagined pursuer ; and, on 
more than one occasion, the waiter at the hotel surprised 
me by some observations he made on the affair of the pre- 
ceding night ; which struck me the more, because another 
servant had told us this same jeweller was in the habit of 
bringing his trinkets to the hotel when there were strangers 
there. 

We passed this day in the same way as the preceding 
one ; not that I was altogether quite at ease in being de- 
layed. The affair of the jeweller troubled me little, com- 
pared to the hazard of personal discovery. Some of the 
vessels I had plundered at sea might be in this port ; and 
notwithstanding the difference in my dress, some person or 
other might recollect me. My mind then reverted to the 
schooner ; for however secure she might be in her present 
berth for a day or two, some accident might discover her ; 
and she was only in comparative safety when in motion, 
with a good offing. Then there was a magnet, stronger 
than all these prudential considerations to hasten my depart- 
ure, — my own little turtle dove, Zela, who, I knew, would 
outwatch the stars, and find no rest while I was absent. 
This determined me to embark that night, in despite of 
wind and weather, which was still cloudy and unsettled ; 
and, what is often the case in these latitudes, the day-breeze 
went down with the sun. 

I pass over my parting with Aston ; indeed, to avoid 
some portion of the pain, I took advantage of his absence, 
and wrote him a short adieu, leaving the fifty or sixty gold 
mores I had about me in the sleeve of his jacket, so that he 
could not fail to find them. 

I made no mention of my departure to any one in the 
house. As to baggage, it consisted of nothing but my 
abbah, which the occasional showers made no burden. 
Modern frippery of combs, razors, brushes, and linen, 



A YOUNGER SON. 281 

which prevents a man from sleeping out of his own house 
without the incumbrance of the best part of a haberdasher's 
shop, I never dreamed of. My teeth were as strong and 
white as a hound's without the aid of hog's bristles. My 
head was not, as before, shaved, but thickly sprouting like 
a bramble bush, and was left to its natural growth with as 
little care and cultivation as is bestowed on that most fondly 
remembered fruit-tree. I say so, because, in common with 
all young urchins, I recollect the time when, spurned like 
a dog from the vicinity of every other fruit-tree, I solaced 
myself under the friendly bramble, and its beloved com- 
panion, the beautiful hazel. Sacred haunts ! unprotected 
by churlish guardians, and where, by the by, we eat without 
having planted. This must be the reason why starving 
poets call nature and mother earth bountiful, — there can 
be no other ; for only be detected in extracting a turnip, 
and hear what a magistrate will say, particularly if he is 
clerical. You will then find mother earth the worst of step- 
mothers, and have enough of her in the colonies. 



CHAPTER XXX. 

The waning moon, 
Anu like a dying lady, lean and pale, 
Who totters forth, wrapt in a gauzy veil, 
Out of her chamber, led by the insane 
And feeble wanderings of her fading brain. Shelley. 

He dies ! 'Tis well she do not advertise 

The caitiff of the cold steel at his back. Keats' MS. 

Thus unincumbered, a little before midnight, and avoiding 
the most populous parts of the town, I walked as fast as 
possible ; but the night, and the narrow, dirty lanes, con- 
siderably impeded my progress. At length I reached the 
open space near the now quiet port, in my way to the out- 
side of the town, where was a rude sort of half-finished 
dock-yard, off one of the slips of which lay my proa. The 
weather was favourable ; what wind there was, I observed. 



282 ADVENTURES OF 

by the occasional gusts, was not stationary, but shifting 
about in all quarters. Dark and white masses of clouds 
seemed jostling together ; and, every now and then, as they 
met in contention over the moon, the world was left in 
almost total darkness. Men from the shore hallooing their 
vessels to send boats, and the " All's well \" of the sepoy 
sentinels, were the only voices I heard. When out of the 
town, my heart became lighter, and my stride longer, as I 
beheld the free expanse of sea on my right, and the moun- 
tains before me ; either of them would have been a refuge, 
had I been pursued; however, I now considered myself 
out of danger. I came on a little line of huts, and a wooden 
fence, which I had not observed before. A sentinel, stand- 
ing under the lee of a hut, stepped forward, as I was 
passing, and said, cc Who goes there ? — - stop !*' 

How near the guard was I knew not ; therefore, to pre- 
vent his giving an alarm which he would have done had I 
not stopped, I obeyed, and, to preserve my Indian charac- 
ter, answered in Hindostanee, iC A friend." 

He then questioned me, in the usual manner, about 
where I was going, and upon what business. On my re- 
plying, he said, " You can't pass here without an order." 

"I know that/' I answered; " I have one;" — I 
fumbled in my dress for a letter or paper. I took one out, 
and, with great appearance of simplicity, advanced towards 
him, and said, (e Here, sir, it is ! " 

He bade me keep off, and was bringing his musket 
down, when I sprang in upon him, griped him by the 
throat, which prevented his giving the alarm, and laid him 
on his back in an instant. His musket fell from his hands ; 
and this little irascible Bombay soldier struggled hard to 
loosen my hold, and lay hands on me ; but he had no more 
chance than a cat with a mastiff. I held him till he was 
almost strangled ; then, the moon being again hidden by 
the clouds, I cast his bayonet one way, his musket another, 
let him go, arose, and bolted off in the direction I had 
come, as if returning to the town. But I took the contrary 
direction, and, giving the arsenal a wide berth, went 
through some Indian corn-fields. When at a sufficient 
distance, I again slanted down towards the sea. More than 



A YOUNGER SON. 283 

once, it seemed, I was followed. I stopped, and turned 
round. As I regained the beaten track, I fancied I saw a 
figure skulking along, his shadow reflected on a wall. I 
drew my creese, and, turning back, sought vainly for the 
object. The changing and uncertain light made my efforts 
fruitless ; I concluded it was a shadow created by my ex- 
cited imagination, and w r ent on. 

As the moon again shone forth, I saw, between me and 
the sea, a building close on the beach, in a bite of the bay, 
which I knew to be a public slaughter-house. A little 
farther on was an enclosed slip, in which a vessel had been 
built or repaired. Half a mile onward, off at sea, lay my 
proa expecting me. 

I stopped on a little mound of sand, looking to seaward, 
if I could make out the boat. One of the walls of the 
slaughter-house was by the side of this, and I leaned on it. 
At this moment, with a gleam of moonlight behind me, my 
shadow was reflected slantingly on the white ground, when 
a huge arm uplifting a weapon, large (such it appeared in 
shadow) as a spear, was in the act of stabbing. I turned, 
and thrust my left hand, in which my cloak was gathered, 
to ward off the blow, for it was a man with a creese in the 
very act of despatching me. The blow pierced through 
many folds of the strong camel's hair, but the point of the 
weapon was turned, and glanced on my loins. I gave a 
shout, started back, presented a small pistol Aston had 
given me, and snapped it in the fellow's face. The Bir- 
mingham toy was not made for use; it missed fire; I cursed 
its manufacturer, threw it away, and drew my creese, in 
the use of which, thanks to the Rais, I was perfect, i 
having the upper ground, the assassin could not repeat his 
blow. He believed the first had wounded me; and, know- 
ing his weapon to be poisoned, and if the skin was but 
scratched, it was enough, he endeavoured to escape. 

Instantly I was at his heels. He was swift of foot, and 
so was I. By the turnings and twistings he made, he 
seemed acquainted with the localities of the ground, over 
which I repeatedly stumbled. Yet I pressed him so hard, 
calling out, " Stop — or I'll fire !" (though I had no fire- 
arms,) that he suddenly turned through a gap in a wall, a 



284 ADVENTURES OF 

loose stone of which I caught up and hurled at him. 
Following close upon him I found, by the spars and timber 
which impeded me, that I was in the temporary dock. It 
had, I remembered, a high fence on each side ; for I had 
been down there twice to speak with my men. The deep 
slip, or channel, which had been cut to float a vessel in, 
now almost free from water, lay in front. I therefore 
thought him embayed here. However, the man went 
straight on, then turned, and hesitated an instant. I ima- 
gined he was about to turn round, and again attack me. 
The night had become a little lighter, but I could distin- 
guish no features in his dusky face, except the eyes glaring 
on me. As I was now rushing on him, he eluded my grasp 
by stepping aside, for he was on the very verge of the deep 
chasm, and walking, as it at that moment appeared, in the 
air ; whence he turned his head towards me, and exclaimed, 
— u Robber and murderer, you dare come no farther ! " 

The moon, again unveiled, explained the mystery. The 
shaft of an unbarked tree, the larger part towards the side 
on which I stood, lay horizontally across the chasm ; and 
the man, steadying himself, and clinging with his bare feet, 
was cautiously crossing on it. 

He paused to defy and execrate me; and I, hesitating 
what to do, said, — " Cowardly slave ! who are you ? — 
and why have you attacked me?" 

With his ghastly face towards me, he replied, " I am 
the jeweller you robbed, the brother of him you stabbed ! 
But I am revenged!" 

i( You lie — you are not ! " 

" Fool !" said he, holding up a creese, " if this did not 
go deep, the poison on it will 1 " 

" Will it ? " I cried, and, without more hesitation, having 
shaken off my shoes, I sprang along the spar. He jumped 
on it, perhaps to increase the vibration, or to cross it, or to 
turn — I know not. My action was so rapid that, quick 
as lightning runs along an iron rod, I closed with him. 
He was surprised, if not panicstruck. The impetus with 
which we met destroyed our equilibrium, and we fell to- 
gether, neither making the vain effort of using the dagger. 
The jeweller, who was on a smaller and more rounded por~ 



A YOUNGER SON. 28 5 

tion of the spar, and, I believe, in the act of turning, made 
a desperate effort, as he fell, to catch hold of me, when we 
should have been precipitated together in the dark gulf. 
But it was not so decreed ; for he only clutched my dress, 
which rent asunder, and I heard him fall heavily beneath. 

I had fallen on my face, and clung round the spar with 
my legs and one arm, for in the fall I seemed to have dis- 
located the other. My body was light, and my limbs long 
and sinewy. I contrived, though I hardly know how, to 
thus support and save myself ; but I remember what toil 
and peril I had in crawling along, hand and foot, on this 
dangerous bridge, which now, to my mind, was as difficult 
to cross as the bridge which Mahomet calls al Sir at, finer 
than a hair, and sharper than the edge of a sword, with the 
gulf of hell gaping below. 

It was strange that, when the jeweller caught at me, and 
rent my vests, the gold boxes, the source of all this mischief, 
dropped from my bosom, (for, after what had occurred, I 
did not think it right to give them to Aston,) and I saw 
them glittering, as I imagined, on the man's head. 



CHAPTER XXXI. 

A bitter death, a suffocating death, 

A muffled death, ensnared in horrid silence, 

Suck'd to my grave amid a dreary calm! Keats' MS. 

On regaining the brink of the chasm, breathless and al- 
most exhausted, suffering from a contusion on my head 
and wrist, I sat down on the margin of that deep and 
dismal gulf, which gaped like a charnel- vault beneath me, 
and looked the more deep and terrific under the clear 
moonlight. Then the noise from below, which the parsee 
made, struggling for life ; for at the bottom of the canal 
was a little stagnant water, dammed up with sand from 
the sea, and sludge washed down by the torrents, with all 
the accumulated filth from the slaughter-house — being a 



286 ADVENTURES OF 

consistency in which no man could long float, or imme- 
diately sink ; but every struggle made it worse. The 
man had sunk deep the first plunge, and his hard efforts 
to rise were apparent from the speechless agony with 
which he toiled, and the quick and stifling noise he made, 
as if half suffocated by the slimy composition. He panted, 
gasped, and floundered on the surface. I could perceive 
no more than an indistinct mass thus writhing and groan- 
ing in torture. It was a horrible sight, and, though not 
very nervous, my flesh quivered, and my whole frame 
shook as in sympathy with his sufferings. 

I gazed round in the vain endeavour of seeking some- 
thing to aid me in rescuing him ; but though the moon 
shone brightly, it only showed me the hopelessness of the 
man's situation. I tried to keep my eyes off, but, as if 
fascinated, I could not. I had almost determined to give 
the alarm, by calling for assistance (as I supposed a sen- 
tinel could not be very far), regardless of consequences to 
myself. 

The struggle now became feeble, and the noise indis- 
tinct, rattling, and hoarse. I looked, and the dark mass 
was slowly sinking beneath the slimy surface ; and, as he 
sunk for ever, I thought I saw an arm still holding its 
serpentine weapon, which seemed (as it might have been 
from his convulsive death) quivering while it gradually 
sunk — shaking, as it were, still in defiance ! 

I remembered he had told me it was poisoned, and his 
last action reminded me of a venomous serpent I had killed 
the day before, which, whilst expiring with its emerald- 
green eye sparkling, and inflated hood, yet shot forth 
its forked tongue, as if in revengeful rage not to be 
subdued. 

My eyes were riveted on the spot where the man had 
disappeared. The bubbling and disturbed surface was 
subsiding into smoothness, when I was suddenly so 
startled as nearly to lose my balance and fall down 
headlong, at hearing a voice at my ear call out — " All's 
well ! " 

It was the voice of a distant sentinel, borne on the wind 
while my head was on the ground near the fatal spar which 



A YOUNGER SOX. 28J 

crossed the chasm, and which acted as a conductor. This, 
and the extreme stillness of the night, made the voice 
seem close to me, and certainly alarmed me more than I 
had ever been alarmed. 

I sprang on my feet, and looked round fearfully ; but 
all was again still. Daylight was approaching, and every 
moment precious. I cast a last look at the spot where 
the man had sunk, and a pang of remorse came over me 
as I recalled the occurrences of the two last days, in which 
I had been the cause of the destruction of this man's pro- 
perty, perhaps of his brother's life, and then of himself. 
What havoc and sorrow had I caused in his family ; what 
curses must fall on my head ! — What demon of mischief 
urged me on ? His death-cries long haunted me. 

It appeared to me, on after-reflection, that the waiter, 
or some other person in the tavern, had suspected me as 
concerned in the jeweller's affair — that he had acquainted 
him with his suspicions — that, during my morning walk, 
the jeweller had seen and recognised me — that he had 
afterwards followed and kept sight of me down to the place 
where my boat lay. 

Had he given notice to the authorities, and charged me 
with being the principal in the attack on his shop, he per- 
haps was aware of, or had experienced the tardy and cor- 
rupt proceedings of courts, and the little justice got by law : 
besides, there are wrongs which cannot be righted by law, 
and for which men seek redress in vengeance. Feelings 
of this sort must have determined him on attempting to 
kill me. If he had indeed known who I really was, his 
revenge would have been effectually executed by simply 
informing against me ; but of this he had no suspicion. 

I hastened down to the beach, as if pursued ; and, de- 
scrying the proa, I was about to hail her, when I called to 
mind the vicinity of the sentinel, My left wrist was 
strained or dislocated — the hot blood was trickling down 
my face, and I was suffused with a clammy heat. I 
looked anxiously along the margin of the sea for a boat, 
but could discover none that would serve my turn. 
Every instant of delay augmented the hazard of detec- 
tion : I therefore secured the few things which would be 



288 ADVENTURES OP 

destroyed by water, in my cap, and walked into the sea, 
which was smooth, with a breeze from the land. I swam 
as fast as I could, having the use of but one paddle. 
There was no difficulty in this to one like me, who could 
swim nearly as well as walk, and whose daily pastime, 
when at Madras, had been in buffeting through the tre- 
mendous surf in which no European boat can live. But the 
danger I ran was from sharks and alligators, which were 
multitudinous about this island, the latter of which I knew 
used to swarm round the outlet from the slaughter house, 
attracted by the smell of offal. Perhaps they were then 
banqueting on the wretched jeweller. 



CHAPTER XXXII. 



As past the pebbly beach the boat did flee 

On sidelong wing, into a silent cove 

Where ebon pines a shade under the starlight wove. Shellet. 

With shatter'd boat, oar snapt, and canvass rent, 

I slowly sail, scarce knowing my intent. Keats. 

Happily I got on board the proa; and, having silently 
weighed our grapnel, we all lay down, and let the boat 
drift out in the channel, till the fishing canoes ran out, 
when we paddled amongst them, hoisted our main-sail, and 
ran over to the Malabar shore : there being little wind 
during the day, we paddled along the shore ; and, as the 
clouds towards evening again threatened a squally night, we 
went into a little open cove, not having any visage of being 
inhabited. 

There we beached our boat, and prepared to sup and 
sleep under the shelter of some pine trees, growing close 
to the sea. Meanwhile two Malays speared fish from the 
rocks, and others lighted a fire against a huge teak-tree, 
which, as I afterwards learnt, had crept into the forest, 
and continued burning for seven or eight months. Wea- 
ried and worn out, after having placed two men as outposts 



A YOUNGER SON. 2$9 

some distance from us, and appointed a strict watch to be 
kept, I selected a soft stone as a pillow for my head, and 
with my feet to the fire, wrapped in the boat's sail, I 
slept so soundly that neither the wind nor rain, which 
came on in the night, awakened me. 

An hour before daylight I was called. My limbs were 
cold and stiff. Coffee and smoking, my never-failing 
remedies in the morning, refreshed me. We launched 
our boat, and, with a breeze still from the land, made 
good way through the water, keeping well out to meet the 
sea-breeze. After mid-day the weather became clear and 
bright, and, about midnight, we ran along the north-east 
side of the island, at which the schooner was moored. 
We did not see her, so snug was her berth, until we 
rounded an estuary. A man on the look-out on shore, 
belonging to the schooner, descried us. As we approached, 
I perceived Zela, with my pocket telescope, looking through 
one of the ship's glasses. 

Springing over the schooner's low gunwale, I lifted her 
up by the waist, which had outgrown my span. I pressed 
her to my bosom in rapture, carried her down the hatchway, 
and placed her on the cabin table. Then, turning to my 
mate, I said, " Strong, have you seen any strangers in the 
offing?" 

" Only country craft, sir/' 

iC No matter. Get under weigh, and let us make a 
stretch to the eastward." 

I should have mentioned that I had previously examined 
the place which I thought the jeweller's creese had grazed, 
but could discover no wound. The loose and thick folds 
of my camel-haired abbah and the shawls round my 
waist had saved me. My eyes were both blackened by the 
blow on my brow, and my left wrist was swollen and 
painful. 

, My abbah I had picked up, so there was not the 
minutest clue by which the jeweller's friends could 
trace him or me. Whether the sentinel, with whom I had 
the scuffle, gave an alarm, or made a report, I know 
not. Probably, as he had committed a fault in permitting 



290 ADVENTURES OF 

me to come near him without giving an alarm, he was 
silent. 

Zela's paramana (nurse), old Kamalia, doctored my 
wounds ; and Zela chafed my temples, and rubbed my 
stiffened limbs with cajeput oil and camphor. Whether it 
was this hot oil, or the hand acting in animal magnetism, 
or roast fowls and claret, or my callian and coffee, or 
guava jelly and sweeter lips to kiss, that restored me, 
is a mystery. But certain it is that these external and 
internal applications restored my body's health. My arm 
I was obliged to keep some time in a sling ; and I hardly 
think it ever regained its former strength. 

De Ruyter having told me he should go through the 
straits of Sunda, and touch at Java, I proceeded to 
Borneo. I passed the straits of Drion ; but, anxious to 
get through these, I did not run out of my way to board 
any of the country vessels, which I occasionally fell in 
with. The first vessel I boarded was some time after this, 
at the dawn of day. She was a singularly constructed and 
rigged vessel, coming right down on us, apparently of 
less than a hundred tons burden, with two masts, snow- 
fashion ; her ropes were principally of a dark grass, her 
sails of purple and white cotton, though some looked like 
matting; her hull was high out of the water, bleached 
to a whitish brown ; her bottom (for I could almost see 
the kelston as she rolled heavily, more from want of 
ballast, and the weight above board, than from any swell 
of the sea,) was overgrown with barnacles, sea-weed, 
and green slime. She yawned so widely about, owing 
to bad steering, that I could scarcely keep clear of her. 
I fired a musket for her to heave to, which she did in 
so lubberly a manner, by heaving up in the wind, that 
she was nearly dismasted. A strange antediluvian crew of 
almost naked savages, the most uncouth and wild I had 
ever seen, tattooed from head to foot, were groping about 
her deck and rigging. A ragged piece of painted cloth was 
hoisted by way of ensign. Who or what she was, whence 
come, or whither going, it was impossible to guess. Her 
upper works were so broken and gaping, that you could 
see both into her and through her ; this, with her rent and 



A YOUNGER SON. 291 

ragged train, made her look as if she had been floating about 
ever since the flood, and yet the wonder was how she was 
kept afloat an hour. 

They were attempting to hoist out an old and ornamented 
canoe ; but, to save time, and anxious to examine her, 
more from curiosity than hope of plunder, I lowered a 
small dingy from our stern, and went to board her. On 
nearing ber, I was more astonished at her wild appearance ; 
and, having with great exertion climbed up her projecting 
bamboo outworks, I found the interior far surpassing the 
exterior. Her upper deck was thatched over with coir, 
held together with twined grass cordage. The savage 
crew had palmetta-leaf coverings on their heads, and Adam- 
ite inexpressibles. A very tall, thin, and bony man came 
forward to receive me. He was distinguished from the 
savage group, that crowded around, by his comparative 
fairness and fierceness, besides having more covering to his 
person. His features were prominent, his complexion a 
reddish brown, his hair somewhat darker ; and he would 
have been strikingly handsome in figure and bearing, were 
it not for the extraordinary and grotesque manner in which 
he was tattooed on his face, arms, and breast, which were 
bare. The figure of a hideous serpent was wreathed around 
his throat, as if in the act of strangling him, with its head 
and lancet-like tongue traced on the lower lip, as if, killing 
two-fold, it was darting into his mouth. The bright green 
eye and red tongue of the serpent were so cunningly tat- 
tooed in colours, that, with the movement of the lower jaw, 
they appeared in motion. Yet there was a placid expression 
of the eye and brow which did not correspond with his 
wild attire. I had no time to examine farther, for this 
captain, or chieftain, came forward in a most courteous 
and affable manner, and with a strange accent, but in toler- 
able English said, — " You are English, sir?" (I had 
shown English colours.) 

ie And who are you, sir ? " I asked. 

<e I, sir, am from the Island of Zaoo." 

" What! — where is that ? I never heard of such an 
island." 

He informed me it was in the direction of the Sooloo 
u 2 



292 ADVENTURES OF 

archipelago. " But it is strange/* I said, for his manner 
struck me more than his appearance ; " are you of those 
islands ? " 

" Yes, sir." 

u What! a native?" 

" No, sir." 

" Who are you then ? " 

He paused for a moment, and then answered, — u An 
Englishman, sir." 

" Indeed ! How the devil then came you there, or 
rather here, in this trim ? " 

<l If you '11 walk down in the cabin, I '11 tell you, sir ; 
I 'm afraid I 've little refreshment to offer you," 

Just as we were at the hatchway, I heard a woman's 
cries below. He stopped, and said, " I had forgot, — we 
cannot go down there." 

" Is there any one ill ? " 

" Yes, sir ; one of my wives is lying in, and, I believe, 
before her time. Her labour is brought on by sea-sickness. 
She is suffering dreadfully." 

I sent for old Kamalia, telling him I had a wife on 
board, and that her nurse, as I had understood, was learned 
in these cases. Zela's paramana soon came on board ; 
when, not to interrupt them, we sat apart on the deck, near 
the stern, where the stranger thus began : — ' c It is so long 
since I 've spoken my mother tongue, and the circumstances 
I am going to relate happened so many years ago, that I 
shall make a bungling story of it, and am afraid you '11 not 
understand me." 

" Well," said I, "it is almost calm, and we have time ; 
so don't hurry yourself. And as you seem not to be very 
well found in the grubber y line, I '11 send for something to 
freshen your memory, while you recall old times.' , 

We were soon supplied from the schooner with beef, 
ham, claret, and brandy. Englishmen hate each other till 
they have eaten together. Eating made us friends, and 
drinking opened our hearts. The only remnant of civilis- 
ation, which still marked him a gentleman, was that he 
smoked without intermission. When our callians were 
lighted, he commenced his narrative ; but in so strange an 



A YOUNGER SON. 293 

idiom, and with so many breaks and stops, that, at first, I 
had great difficulty in comprehending his meaning. For 
the benefit of others, I take the liberty of amending his 
phraseology. 



CHAPTER XXXIII. 

Nelson was once Britannia's god of war, 
And still should be so, but the tide is turn'd : 

There 's no more to be said of Trafalgar, 
'Tis with our hero quietly inurn'd. Byron. 

€C Seven or eight years ago/' he said, " I left England in 
an East India Company's ship, with convoy, bound to 
Canton. The first officer, who had mercantile transactions 
with my father, and was considerably his debtor for prior 
investments, induced him to furnish him with a still 
larger investment than usual, upon condition that I, who 
was a clerk in my father's house, was to be shipped as a 
midshipman, and to receive a certain portion of the profits, 
on my father's account, arising from the investment. Pro- 
perly instructed in this, I was to make the voyage, and, if 
I liked it, to continue in the service ; if not, to return to 
the counting-house. At the age of fifteen I need not say 
how gladly I quitted debiting and crediting, invoice books, 
journals, and ledgers, to go to a country of which I had 
heard so much, and to rank among those aspirants, who 
used to give themselves such airs, and appear so happy, 
when they were on shore; — not knowing then that the 
cause of their joy on shore was the being released from a 
tyrannical subjection on board those worst of prison- ships, 
East Indiamen. However, under the patronage of the first 
officer, my initiation into the service might be supposed 
favourable. 

" But we had not long sailed from the Downs, when I ex- 
perienced a visible alteration for the worse. For, besides the 
degrading and abject services in which the class I belonged 
to was employed, the first mate, my patron, in whose 
u 3 



294* ADVENTURES OF 

watch I was, turned suddenly upon me, without any fault 
on my part, and reviled and abused me. From that time, 
he treated me, on all occasions, with mockery and contempt, 
Not satisfied with making me do the most menial offices, 
he punished me for his sport ; for I gave him no cause. 
He one day told me, in his passion, that my usurious old 
Jew of a father had hooked me on him as a spy, to defraud 
him of his freightage ; adding, " He made me give a bond 
too as security, but I '11 be damned if I don't make a bond- 
slave of you ! " It is needless to tell you what a miserable 
life I led. 

iC Our captain lived apart, as a sort of deity, and so I 
believe he thought himself. He associated with none but 
two or three of the passengers of the highest rank, and 
issued all his orders through the first officer. One night, 
off Madeira, it was blowing hard, when a man called out, 
— e A strange sail on the weather bow!' I was standing 
near him, and answered, — * Very well, I'll report it;' — 
though I saw nothing but what seemed a great black cloud, 
and proceeded aft to acquaint the first officer with it, who 
had charge of the watch. I beheld him asleep on the 
carronade slide; a new feeling awoke in my bosom, — 
revenge ! " 

zi What," I asked, " did you stab the fellow, and throw 
his carcass overboard ? " 

" Oh, no; it was but a boyish spite; — if I were to 
meet him now, perhaps I might do as you say. I left him 
asleep, and went down to the captain, whom I awoke with, 
— c There is a large ship just under our lee-bow !' 

" He started up, saying, ( Where is the officer of the 
watch ? ' 

" ' I cannot find him, sir.' 

" c Not find him!' and up rushed the captain. The 
officer was sleeping close to the companion ladder ; so that, 
on the captain's putting his foot on the deck, he stood before 
him, and called out his name. The affrighted sleeper 
sprung up at the well-known voice of his stern commander. 
But there was no time to waste in words ; it was blowing 
a hard gale, and the sea running high ; the dark and moving 
mass which, an instant before, I had thought a cloud or 



A YOUNGER SON. 29^ 

land, now in the form of an immense ship dismasted, came 
driving towards us. Our captain roared out to put the 
helm down, and turn the hands up ; but it seemed too late. 
A voice, trying to make itself heard through a trumpet, 
hailed us as from a tower, for so she loomed, as she drifted 
before the wind, borne on by a gigantic sea, which lifted 
her above us. The blue lights burning on her forecastle 
were reflected on our close-reefed topsail. It appeared in- 
evitable that, as she replunged in the deep trough of the 
sea, in which we lay, becalmed by her monstrous hull, we 
should be crushed, or cut in two. Our sails struck against 
the masts with a thundering sound ; and the crew, scram- 
bling up the hatchways in their shirts, but half awake, in- 
voluntarily screamed at the sight of the immense ship coming 
upon us. Panic-struck we could do nothing ; and she, 
impelled by the fury of the sea and winds, was borne on ? 
rolling and plunging, without sail or mast to steer or steady 
her. It was a scene that appalled the most hardy ; some 
held out their arms widely, and shrieked ; others fell on 
their knees ; and more threw themselves headlong down 
the hatchways ; and though it was but a moment, such a 
moment makes a boy an old man. A loud and more dis- 
tinctly heard voice, speaking through a trumpet, again 
hailed us, — it seemed our death summons, — ' Starboard 
your helm, or we shall run you down ! ' 

u As the wave was lifting us up, the stranger struck 
us. There was a frightful crash. Then I heard the loud 
shrieks of our men, and giving myself up for lost, con- 
vulsively griped hold of the shrouds, and awaited my fate. 
My eyes were riveted on the stranger ; she passed, as I 
thought, over us, and then lay, like a gigantic rock, im- 
movable, close on our lee-quarter. The gale, unimpeded, 
again roared among our shrouds, and the sea broke over 
us. After a horrible pause, the bustle and the noise of 
the winds, waves, and voices recalled me to my senses. 
The stranger had struck us on our quarter, and carried 
away our quarter gallery, stern-boat, and main-boom ; — 
nothing more, — and we were safe. The ship again hailed 
us, and asked our name. She then ordered us to keep 
u 4 



296* 



ADVENT CRES 0E 



close to her during the night, and added that she was his 
Britannic Majesty's ship, Victory. 

iC That night nothing was said to the first officer ; but 
he was put under close arrest. Indeed the panic was so 
great that, for a long time, every one seemed under a spell, 
and our captain and officers were only recalled to their 
duty by the frequent night-signals from the Victory, with 
the roar of her immense guns to enforce attention to them, 
and to keep us in our station on her lee-quarter ; for 
they feared we should give them the slip during the 
night. 

" In the morning, when I went on deck, I found we 
had lost our convoy ; and the Victory, still close to us, 
w r as making signals for us to take her in tow. For this 
purpose, as there was more swell than a boat could live in, 
we veered an empty cask astern, with a rope attached to 
it, for her to take on board. This done, she fastened 
halsers, as big as our cables, to the rope ; and we hauled 
them on board over the taffrail, secured them to our 
main-mast, made all the sail we could carry, and bore up 
for the island of Madeira. Our situation was most peril- 
ous ; for, notwithstanding the great length of the halsers 
by which we were towing, the weight and size of the Vic- 
tory, then the largest ship in the world, gave us dreadful 
shocks as we lifted up trembling on the crest of a wave, 
and she sank beneath us in its hollow, — she seemed 
dragging us stern foremost downward ; then again when 
we laboured, becalmed in the deep trough, and she was 
lifted up, she appeared plunging down directly on us. 
Sometimes the tow ropes, though nearly the size of my 
body, snapped like rotten twine ; and we had again the 
difficult and dangerous task of getting her tow-ropes on 
board. Luckily that night the wind abated, or I think 
we should both have foundered. The strain on our ship 
was so great, that besides the danger of carrying away our 
main -mast, the seams of our deck opened, and the sea 
broke over us, sweeping away all before it, and threatened 
destruction by filling us with water. Our captain hailed 
the Victory, and represented our danger : the only reply 
was, ( If you cast off the tow-rope, we will sink you/ 



A YOUNGER SON. 2Q7 

" On board the Victory, they had eased her by throwing 
overboard the guns on her upper deck, setting storm- sails 
on the stumps of her lower masts, and by every means in 
their power. The next day the gale was considerably 
abated, though the sea was still heavy. We brought to 
a large West India ship bound to Madeira, and she was 
compelled to take our place. 

Ci Our captain then went on board the late admiral's 
ship, when her commander, after reprimanding him for 
his bad look-out during the night, said he should pass 
over his conduct in consideration of the service he had 
done in having been the means of saving to his majesty 
and his country the most valuable of their ships that bore 
the triumphant flag of Nelson, and that was then bearing 
his body. 

C( He gave our captain a certificate to this effect. This 
somewhat appeased our proud commander ; and, the 
danger over, his wrath was allayed against the delinquent 
officer, whom he had threatened, in his passion, to anni- 
hilate. Besides, they were relations, or at least of the same 
name — Patterson ; and you know, sir, Scotchmen are 
clansmen, and care not if all the world goes to wreck, so 
that their own particular clan escapes, and profits by the 
general loss. But I ask your pardon, sir, — there may be 
some very good men amongst them." 



CHAPTER XXXIV. 

That boat and ship shall never meet again! Byron. 

Thou must hold water in a witch's sieve, 

And be liege lord of all the elves and fays, 

To venture so. Keats. 

fi The first officer," he continued, " returned to his duty, 
and had no difficulty in tracing the origin of his disgrace 
to me. I need not say my condition was not improved 
by this event. Oh, how I envied the life of the most ill- 



298 ADVENTURES OF 

used chimney-sweeper or outcast beggar ! Their exist- 
ence seemed passed in bliss compared to mine ! Besides, 
they could fly from a heartless beadle or cruel master, 
while I (for so I then thought) was a hopeless slave. 
But, sir, I am detaining you." 

ce Oh, no," I replied, " go on ;" for the similarity of 
this man's fate with Walter's doubly interested me, and I 
already felt a friendship for the narrator. By gazing on 
his features, as he spoke, I was soon familiarised to the 
sight of the frightful figures portrayed on his skin, and 
(( saw his visage in his mind." 

cc At length," said he, " by the usual passage, we en- 
tered the China seas. One night, the ship being anchored 
off an island (for what purpose I forget), I was ordered 
in the boat which lay astern, to take care of her. Sud- 
denly the thought crossed my mind that I might take ad- 
vantage of this and escape. Without for a moment 
weighing the hazards of such an enterprize, I gave myself 
up to the impulse. There was a mast, a sail, and a keg 
of water in the boat, for she had been employed in land- 
ing on the island to leeward of us, to seek for water. 
This determined me. It did not then occur to me there 
were so many things necessary, especially bread. I had 
only brought my supper of biscuit and beef with me : 
compass and charts I never thought of. The night was 
dark, a steady breeze blowing out of the gulf, and the 
sea tolerably smooth. I took a favourable opportunity of 
all being quiet on board, slipped the painter which held 
the boat, and, after drifting astern in fearful suspense for 
a short time, got the mast up, veered round, and soon lost 
sight of the ship. 

" An hour elapsed, when I thought I saw a lantern 
hoisted by her, and afterwards plainly distinguished a blue- 
light. I hauled in towards the island, that, by running to 
leeward of it, I might be screened when daylight should 
appear. Thanks to my having been born near a dock- 
yard, and to my fondness for boating, I had learned to 
manage a boat very well. 

ce But only, sir, think an instant on the alteration a few 
months had made in my fate, and more particularly that 



A YOUNGER SON. 2Q9 

of a few hours ; yet the last I could not regret. My heart, 
however, misgave me when at sunset the next evening I 
pondered on my desolate condition — alone in a little boat, 
without compass, or the means of existence, on the wide 
ocean, the wild waters all around me, and the cloudy and 
then starless sky above me. My folly struck me to the 
heart. I wished myself on board the ship again. I wept 
bitter tears, resigned the helm in despair, and left the boat 
to be drifted at the mercy of the sea and winds. Hunger 
long kept my eyes open : however, at last, after drinking 
some water, I slept, overcome by toil and fasting. My 
sleep was long and troubled : it was near day when I 
aw T oke, and the sky was clear. I again loosened the sail 
to the breeze, and ran before the wind. I endeavoured 
to think what course 1 was in. From the direction of the 
wind and the north star, I concluded I was running to- 
wards the islands in the Sooloo archipelago, and that the 
high land which I saw in the morning was Borneo. I was 
steering nearly due south, and the island of Paragua, near 
which I had left the ship, must have been nearly astern. 
The breeze continued fresh, and my little bark went fast 
through the w r ater. There was no vessel of any kind in 
sight. I detected myself unconsciously nibbling round 
the rim of my only remaining biscuit. I considered if I 
should haul in for Borneo ; but the wind veered several 
points, and, finding I should have to beat up to it, I was 
forced to proceed. 

(i The fear of starvation already made me feel starving : 
yet the wind freshened, and I knew I could not be long 
without making one of the countless islands which lay be- 
fore me. I was determined to run slap ashore on the first 
I could. This day I passed in torture from hunger : I 
felt sick and desponding. The day passed, when I saw 
no land ahead, and lost sight of the land astern. At night 
I became wild and feverish, and arraigned Providence for 
having abandoned me. The night was clear, almost as 
light as day, and as I sat sullenly at the helm, I heard 
something fall splashingly into the boat, and sprang up for 
joy as I eagerly grasped hold of it — -a bright, silvery- 
scaled fish, nearly a pound in weight. My joy cooled on 



300 ADVENTURES OF 

reflecting that I had no fire to cook it — not even a knife 
to scale it, so ill was I provided. I threw it down in the 
boat, and resumed my desponding station at the helm. 
My eye now caught something dark floating on the surface 
of the water : I edged the boat that way, and stretching 
out my arms, lifted what I thought a small log of wood, 
but which proved to be a turtle. I threw it in the 
bottom of the boat. These two god-sends, by lengthening 
the distance between me and starvation, re-assured my 
mind, and, lashing the helm, I again fell asleep. 

ce But I was soon awakened by the water rushing over 
the gunwale of the boat, which heeling over on the side I 
was lying, it covered me. I believed she was swamping, 
but had recollection enough to cast off the sheet, when the 
boat righted, though up to the thwarts in water, Securing 
the sail, I turned to with my cap, and baled. The wind 
had freshened, the sea was getting up, and the weather 
lowered threateningly. Still the night was light. I reefed 
the sail, again set it, the boat scudded at a great rate, and 
I felt confident of seeing some land in the morning. 

" I now became so hungry that I sought out the fish, 
and, from biting and sucking at the tail, I proceeded up- 
wards towards the head. It was so deliciously refreshing, 
so far superior to any I had ever eaten before, that I won- 
dered people spoiled them by cooking. However, I had 
forbearance to stop when I came to the thick part, to re- 
serve it for a relish on the morrow : but this served rather 
to sharpen my appetite, than appease my hunger. I be- 
gan to look longingly and greedily on the turtle, which was 
flapping about, and, remembering it had nearly escaped 
when the water came into the boat, I lashed it by the fins. 
The remainder of the night was passed in thinking how I 
could open the shell to get at the meat ; and I cursed my 
improvidence again and again, in not having provided my- 
self with a knife, a compass, a quadrant, and a nory. It 
seemed I only wanted these four articles to fit me for cir- 
cumnavigating the globe : for you know, sir, a man feels 
full of confidence after a good supper." 



A YOUNGER SON. 301 



CHAPTER XXXV. 

With dizzy swiftness, round, and round, and round, 

Ridge after ridge the straining boat arose, 

Till on the verge of the extremest curve, 

Where through an opening of the rocky bank 

The waters overflow, and a smooth spot 

Of glassy quiet mid those battling tides 

Is left, the boat paused shuddering. Shelley. 

(i That night I ran a great distance. As the day broke, I 
watched with intense anxiety to discover land ahead. There 
was as much sea running as my small boat could live in, and 
I was kept almost constantly baling. My life seemed to de- 
pend on making land quickly ; and I cannot describe my 
disappointment and horror, when the day did appear, to see 
I had run past several small islands in the dark, and the 
wide sea before me, without a solitary speck on the horizon. 
The remainder of the fish — I could not help it — I had 
devoured during the night. I made a vain attempt to 
haul my wind, and fetch one of the islands I had passed ; 
but the wind and sea were too high, and if I had not in- 
stantly again put the boat before the wind, I should have 
been swamped. 

" A few hours after, notwithstanding every effort to 
keep my eyes on the horizon ahead, that I might catch 
the first appearance of land, and shape my course so as 
not again to get to leeward of it, fierce famine again so 
gnawed my stomach that, in spite of every endeavour to 
the contrary, from occasional wanderings my eye became 
fixed and riveted on the turtle. I could attend to nothing 
else. If I exerted myself to slue my head in another di- 
rection, it was only like shaking a compass — the turtle 
acting on my eye-ball as the pole on the magnetic needle, 
bringing it always round again to the same point. My 
thoughts, too, were absorbed in imagining the possible means 
of opening its shell. I unlashed it, brought it aft, and pored 
over the mazy, coloured lines and divisions marked on 
its back, as if I had been studying a chart. Never had 
I seen any thing so well secured, except the iron chest in 
my father's counting-house, to open either of which with- 



30% ADVENTURES OF 

out iron appeared impossible. Then I studied the struc- 
ture of the boat till I could have built one, to discover if a 
bolt or nail might be safely substracted ; but in vain. The 
extremities of the turtle, indeed, seemed more in my power; 
but one end was fast locked by its horny head and bony 
fins, and the other by his fins and a substance tougher 
than the sole of my shoe. As to its head, as if aware of 
my purpose, it never even put it out. I then tried to crack 
the shell by beating it against the gunwale of the boat ; 
but the boat was stove, without the slightest fracture in 
the shell. After many fruitless attempts, I succeeded in 
grasping hold of its head, when I secured it with a rope- 
yarn, and, making use of the last expedient, at length I 
killed it/' 

"But how?" I asked. 

" By gnawing through the skin of the throat, though 
my eyes were well nigh beaten out by the fins. Then I 
thrust my fingers into the breast, forced off the fins, and 
so got into it. But in my haste, or from ignorance, for 
I knew nothing about the matter, I suppose I burst the 
gall; for though I washed the flesh well, it was very 
bitter. The eggs, of which it was full, though they were 
very small, were the best part. However, my appetite 
was appeased, and I now turned my attention to look out 
for land ; when I shouted with rapture as I discerned it 
on my starboard bow/' 

While describing his contention with the turtle, his 
looks and gestures became so fiercely vehement, that I 
shoved over to him the remains of the meat on the table ; 
and kept my throat at a respectable distance from his 
vulture-like claws, which the black lines tattooed on them 
made them resemble. 

" At the sight of land/' said he, " my expiring energies 
were awakened. The breeze was still increasing, and, 
fearful a gale was coming on, I exerted myself to make 
the island quickly. Although the boat almost flew through 
the water, so that the spray dashed right over me, I 
thought, in my impatience, she lay like a log. I saw 
several other islands to the south of this. The sun was 
nearly sinking when I had approached the land so as to see 
the surf breaking on the rocks. In my anxiety to be on 



A YOUNGER SON. 303 

shore, I heedlessly let the boat run on, and neglected to 
run along the shore to seek a beach or landing place, and 
avoid the shoals and rocks. Blindly I scudded on even to 
where the surf was highest, and found myself suddenly 
embayed amidst rocks, over which the waves were furi- 
ously and unceasingly breaking. In my too great eager- 
ness to escape from sea-perils, I was devoting myself to 
destruction on the far more dangerous rocks. I let go the 
sheet which held the sail ; it fluttered wildly in the wind. 
The sea-birds flew screaming over me. My little bark, 
almost buried in the spray, which beat on me like a hail- 
storm, was tossed, wheeled, and whirled about, with so 
much water in her, that I hardly knew if I still floated 
in her or in the sea. Just as she was borne by a 
high wave madly against a rock to be dashed to pieces, 
the wave, not breaking, bounded back like a ball, and 
hurried her against the opposite rocks, and then rebounded 
as if in play. The noise of the winds and waves, break- 
ing all about, was deafening. The space between me and 
the shore was white and frothy as milk when overboil- 
ing, and seemed close to me, without a chance of my 
arriving at it. Suddenly the boat disappeared from under 
me. Though I could swim, my efforts were vain ; for 
after I had, with all my strength, approached within an 
arm's length of some of the rocks, the re-action of the swell 
drove me back again, mocking my exertions. At length, 
worn out, and bleeding all over from wounds inflicted by 
the lancet-like points of the coral reefs, against which 
I was driven from time to time, I felt myself going down. 
I believed it was all over with me, and must say that death 
by drowning is not so frightful as it is represented. Per- 
haps my previous exertions, hunger, loss of blood, exhaus- 
tion, and the hopeless situation I might be in if I were 
landed, made it the less bitter. However that may be, a 
calm sensation, almost amounting to pleasure, came over 
me as the water closed over my head. After that, I even 
remember, as I still mechanically or convulsively struggled 
for a few moments, that I seemed suspended under the 
water, not sinking. Then came a pang as if my heart had 
burst, and life was fled." 



304 ADVENTURES OF 



CHAPTER XXXVI. 

The gentle island, and the genial soil, 

The friendly hearts, and feasts without a toii, H 

The courteous manners, but from nature caught, 

The wealth unhoarded, and the love unbought j 

Could these have charms for rudest sea-boys, driven 

Before the mast by every wind of heaven. " Bvrox. 

He paused to fill his callian, and then proceeded in his 
story. fC How long I remained under the water I know 
not. A sensation of dreaming and trying to awake, of 
which I have a faint recollection, was what I next felt, 
and then of suffocation. I thought people were endea- 
vouring to stifle me, "by holding me under the waters of a 
torrent, and that its noise drowned my cries. At last my 
senses were partly restored. I distinguished some figures 
leaning over me. I was giddy, sick, and shivering with 
cold. The people looked very strange, and talked to me ; 
but I could not understand them. They were very kind, 
for they were chafing my body with their hands, to recall me 
to life. But I hasten over this, sir, to tell you of my 
astonishment, when, so far recovered, I could comprehend 
things about me. 

"I lay on the ground with mats under me, and cotton 
cloths above me. There were three women, nearly naked ; 
but I afterwards found their being so was owing to their 
having covered me with their garments, not from the cus- 
tom of the country. Their faces, arms, and necks were 
covered with black lines. They had gold rings in their 
nostrils, and on their arms and ankles. They were very 
young, and were it not, as it then struck me, for the strange 
marks which disfigured them, handsome, and not very dark. 
They screamed when I spoke and moved to sit up. Dread- 
ful hunger had again taken possession of me. I made 
signs to this effect, when they all ran away, but soon re- 
turned with fruits. Greedily were they devoured, one 
after the other, as they gave them ; while they were fright- 
ened at the ferocity with which I ate. 

(i My hunger satisfied, I gazed round to see where I 



A YOUNGER SON. 305 

was, and found myself on the brink of a little river, smooth 
and transparent ; yet I was startled at hearing the loud 
surf breaking near me. It was not in sight, for a high 
screen of rocks lay between me and the sea. It after- 
wards appeared that when I had sunk, a strong under- 
ground eddying current had carried me, along its windings, 
into the mouth of this little river, calm as a pond, being 
completely sheltered from the wind, and not visible from 
the sea, though running into it from a jungle. Three girls, 
who had just come down to this river's mouth in a canoe, 
to be in readiness to spear fish in the night, always plen- 
tiful during boisterous weather at sea, must have arrived at 
the instant my body came up to the surface. Neither sur- 
prise nor fear prevented them from dragging me to the 
shore. For a long time they considered me dead. To 
decoy the fish they lighted a fire, near which they had 
laid me ; a happy chance, as I conjecture, to which I owe 
my life. My first symptoms of breath and motion, as they 
occasionally came to look at me, were sufficient to excite 
them to do all they could to preserve me, which, though 
little, was enough. 

' e I am now, sir, speaking of the ensuing morning ; for 
I remained there all the night under their care. Then I 
was enough recovered to stand on my legs, and they led 
me down to the canoe, which they launched in the river. 
I had a strong repugnance, a dread of the water ; but we 
all embarked. They seated me down in the bottom, and 
commenced with their paddles to urge the boat along. 

ec When we left the little open pool, formed by the 

river, hedged round with rocks, cocoa-nut trees, and yellow 

moss, and ascended the stream, the trees and bamboos were 

so thick on each side, as, in many parts, to meet together 

overhead, and exclude both sun and light. On these trees 

were hanging in clusters, like living fruit, little black 

monkeys not bigger than an apple. The sweet smell of 

the trees and blossoms, and the kind looks of the girls who 

. conducted me, went far towards restoring me. The river 

e ; turned about a good deal, and, at times, narrowed. In 

A many places it had burst through its banks, and formed 

streamlets, of which you could trace the course by the loftier 

x 



306 



ADVENTURES OF 



and brighter trees, and by the luxuriant vegetation. In 
about two hours we came to one of these streamlets ; its 
mouth was larger and deeper than those I had observed 
before ; they turned their canoe into this, and made signs 
for me to land. I did so : the vegetation was so thick 
here, that there was scarcely sufficient space for us to stand 
upon ; nor could I see any path, where the canoe was 
landed, amongst the long wild grass. 

' ' They made signs for me to follow them ; and they 
walked down in the shallow part of the stream for a few 
minutes ; then, after a turn, they came to a path, still by 
the stream. Here, amidst a grove of tall trees, entirely 
cleared from underwood, there was a multitude of little 
huts, built of wood, and covered with leaves. They led 
me into one of two or three, the largest and nigh together, 
fenced by a prickly-pear hedge. 

ec On clapping their hands, a number of old women and 
young naked children came out of different holes and 
corners. After staring at me, they asked a thousand ques- 
tions of the girls who had conducted me thither; then 
they came and scrutinised me, touched my hair and hands, 
and returned to listen again to my story. Soon after all 
the old women of the village, in like manner, visited and 
examined me. 

(c Mean time my hostesses supplied me with abundance 
of provisions, flesh broiled, rice, Indian corn roasted, and 
fruits. What astonished me most was that I saw no men, 
except two or three decrepit ones. But," said my nar- 
rator, " the night is coming on, and therefore I'll hasten 
over my tale of years ; for all seem but as yesterday, since 
few events have marked them. 

" I found a refuge amongst the kindest-hearted and 
most simple-minded people in the world. When I arrived, 
the men of the village, as I afterwards learned, were gone 
to attend the king on a great hunting and fishing tour, 
through and round the island, which takes place twice 
every year. The three girls who had gone fishing down 
the river, and preserved me, were this king's daughters. 
At night when I retired to sleep, my surprise was great 
when the eldest of the girls, after making up for me 



A YOUNGER SON. SO? 

a comfortable bed of reeds and mats, conferred a few 
minutes with her sisters, and then came, and lay down by 
my side," 

On my laughing, the Zaoo Englishman seemed annoyed, 
and said, " Sir, it is the custom of the country for the 
eldest unmarried female of the family to sleep with the 
stranger." 

(i Go on ; I approve of the custom very much. It is 
admirable,~especiaTIy for us travellers; and I wish such sort 
of hospitality were universal/' 

ce From that time," he added, " this girl became my 
wife/' 

That, thought I, alters the case, and I looked grave. 
" The king," continued he, " returned with his people, 
and expressed his surprise and joy at finding me one of 
his family. By degrees I became accustomed to their 
manners, and spoke their language. I had naturally a 
mechanical turn, improved by my vicinity to a dock-yard 
in England, so that I was useful to the old king, who soon 
loved me as a son, and gave his two other daughters to me 
for wives, at their own earnest request. Then I went into 
a separate house, a gift from the king ; but he could not 
long endure my absence. You may see, sir, I have lost 
every vestige of civilisation, and am, as it were, a native of 
the island/' 

ee But," said I, as he concluded, " you have not told me 
whither you are bound/' 

" Oh," he replied, cc as you are English, I believe there 
is no harm in my telling you. Why, sir, within these few 
years, several vessels of the Spaniards and Dutch have 
touched on our island ; and, besides plundering our coasts^ 
they have seized some of the unarmed people to make 
slaves of them. They come from the Philippine Islands. 
1 am going, sir, to petition the aid of the English govern- 
ment in India, and to purchase arms and ammunition for a 
battery, or " 

I interrupted him with, — Ci The latter is wise; but as 
to your petition, — don't think of such a thing. What 
have you to induce the Company to interfere ? " 



308 ADVENTURES OF 

" A valuable pearl fishery/' he said, which neither they 
nor any European is aware of except myself." 

I placed my hand on his mouth, and exclaimed, " Never 
again mention it to a living being, or your island will be 
wrested from you ! Collect your pearls in secret, and 
barter them for arms, or let them lie quietly where they 
are. 

This advice I impressed so seriously on him that, 1 
believe, he has followed it, and I have been careful not to 
betray him. " But still," he said, " I must go to Cal- 
cutta ; for there I hope to hear of my family, and I wish 
to let them know where I am living, and that I am per- 
fectly content. Return to Europe I never will ! Besides 
that I have wives and children here, and am beloved by 
every one, what could I do in Europe with the marks of 
my savage life branded on my face and body ? Here they 
exact reverence, as they show I am the son of a king ; 
there they would make me stared at, and hooted wherever I 
went, like a wild beast." 



CHAPTER XXXVII. 

As to the Christian creed, if true 

Or false, I never question'd it : 
I took it as the vulgar do. 

For my vext souliiad leisure yet 
To doubt the things men say, or deem 
That they are other than they seem. Shelley. 

u But where, in the name of old Neptune,'* I asked, 
e< did you get this antique-looking vessel ? Or is this the 
pearl oyster bank raised up, and set afloat ? " 

" Seventeen or eighteen months ago," he replied, 
« when I was out with a number of canoes, pulling round 
the south-west part of the island, we discovered this vessel, 
dismasted and drifting towards the land. I approached 
her, and, seeing no one, went on board. I found her 



A YOUNGER SON. 309 

entirely abandoned. On opening her hatches, and going 
below, dreadful exhalations arose as from putrid bodies ; 
of which, indeed, we found a heap lying huddled up to- 
gether, in an undistinguishable mass. By a few vestiges 
we believed them to be Lascars or Arabs, or both. There 
was a large ring-tailed cat, together with some great water- 
rats, tearing at and feeding on the corrupted bodies. My 
people said, and I suppose they were right, that it was a 
country vessel, which had been attacked by pirates, and 
the crew massacred. Every thing valuable or portable, 
that could be come at, had been taken from her. We 
towed her into a little port in the island, cleaned her, and 
repaired what we could. I have been a year about her, and 
you see how little I have been able to do, having neither 
proper tools, iron, cordage, tar, paint, canvass, anchor, nor 
cable. Such shifts as I have been put to you perceive. 
Whether I shall proceed, or obey the dictates of common 
sense, and go back, I cannot tell. Your opinion, sir, as 
you seem kindly interested in my behalf, and are my 
countryman, shall decide on my movements." 

I shook hands with him, and professed that, in either 
event, I would do all in my power for him. But, as it 
was then late, I returned to the schooner, with a promise 
to lie by him that night, and to visit him early on the 
morrow, accompanied by my carpenter and boatswain, that 
his vessel might be properly surveyed^ to see if she was 
seaworthy. 

Accordingly, the next morning, a careful examination 
took place, and I received rather a favourable report. 
After consulting with his highness the Prince of Zaoo, 
and having listened to all his motives for wishing to visit 
an European port, where he could procure arms and sup- 
plies, and a variety of articles he wanted, I recommended 
him to run along the Malabar coast,, with the land and 
sea breezes, and go to Pulo Penang, where his vessel would 
be repaired, and put into better sailing trim ; and thence 
to go on to Bengal, as there alone he could procure the 
supplies he wanted. 

In reply to my questions regarding the island and its 
inhabitants, he told me the island is small and low, with 
x 3 



310 ADVENTURES OF 

the exception of one rugged mountain nearly in the centre, 
which the natives informed him had, according to tra- 
dition, been once all on fire. « I therefore conjecture/' 
observed the prince, " it has been a volcano, possibly 
thrown up from the bottom of the sea, and then enlarged, 
as it is now increasing, by the living coral. You know 
how rapid vegetation is in this climate. They add, that 
the village where the king now resides was formerly close 
to the sea ; and by the sand and sea shells found on dig- 
ging, it seems to have been so. The whole island is now 
covered with large timber and impenetrable jungle, except 
towards the summit of the mountain, and in those places, 
near the rivers and the streams, which have been cleared 
by the natives for their dwellings. We have wild and 
tame hogs, goats, deer, monkeys, and poultry ; then there 
are yams, kladi, and a variety of roots and herbs, mangoes, 
plantains, cocoa-nuts, and other fruits, while tne sea coast 
swarms with, shell and other fish. Where Providence 
does so much, we do little but fish and hunt. The inha- 
bitants are wise in contenting themselves with what they 
have, never toiling and sweating for more. What is 
forced and wrung from the earth by hard labour is embit- 
tered by the pain with which it is purchased. The 
women are very industrious, attending to household 
affairs. 

" Our people are spread about the island in villages, 
governed by their own laws, which are simple, equitable, 
and summary. A great council is held twice a year, at 
which the king presides, hears complaints, and settles all 
disputes. Women have their full share of liberty. Every 
one may marry whom she likes, and return to her family 
if ill used by her husband. Before marriage they may 
indulge in sexual intercourse with the unmarried and un- 
betrothed ; but when married, it is considered so infamous, 
that both parties are branded and turned out of the com- 
munity. Polygamy is allowed, though none but chiefs 
are permitted to have more than two wives. As every 
woman is obliged to do the work of her own house and 
family, she is not only content that her husband should 
take another wife, but generally provides him with one 



A YOUNGER SON. 



311 



herself^ either a favourite sister or friend, for there are 
neither slaves nor servants among them. 

" The women are well made, gentle, and remarkably 
attached to their families. They are clean in their persons., 
attired in a cloth made of the bark of a tree, which is both 
soft and durable, and dyed of all colours. Our houses 
are raised a story on bamboos, the lower part serving as a 
magazine for provisions. The tobacco you are now 
smoking grows on the island ; our people all use it. They 
manufacture these wooden pipes out of a sort of jessamine 
creeper, by forcing the pith out when green ; and the 
bowls are made of a hard wood burnt. They make their 
own spears and knives, the handles of which are orna- 
mented with carving. There is a remarkable diversity in 
the features and complexion of the people. Occasionally 
there has been a little commerce, by way of barter, (for 
money is not known,) with small vessels from Borneo; 
which brought iron, hatchets, wire, coarse cloths, brass, and 
old muskets ; and in return received a variety of gums 
and resins, cocoa-nut oil, sandal and kiabouka wood. But 
the approach to the island is dangerous, owing to the 
strong under- ground currents, and the immense coral 
reefs on which the sea is perpetually breaking. Then 
there is only one port, very small, and not very secure.'' 

Upon my inquiring if they had any religion, and what 
it was, he said, " Yes, we have our superstitions, but no 
priests. Our chiefs preside on particular ceremonies, sing 
prayers, and make offerings to the evil spirits." 

" But," I asked, " what is their faith ? " 

" Oh, it is founded on the same as yours at home ; — a 
belief in a good spirit which is above the earth, and in an 
evil one which is beneath it. " 

His highness had victualled his ship with paddy, deer 
and goat's flesh, in slices of about the size of cutlets, dipped 
in salt water, and dried in the sun, and fish cured in the 
same way. Besides, he had great store of cocoa-nuts, and 
a fiery sort of arrack made from the sap of the tree fer- 
mented, with melons, pumpkins, onions, and an extraordi- 
nary supply of tobacco, which was large and thick-leaved, 
but of an excellent flavour. He gave me a boat-load of it, 
x 4 



312 ADVENTURES OP 

and one of his pipes ; the latter 1 still preserve, in memory 
of this strange being ; grotesque and wild figures of non- 
descript animals are deeply chased on it. 

During the day one of his princesses miscarried of a 
prince ; and to my astonishment, shortly after, made her 
appearance on deck, with the intention of bathing in the 
sea. 

Having already expended more time than was warranted 
with him, I gave him a chart and compass, a few bottles 
of brandy, a bag of biscuits, and what was of more im- 
portance, I repaired his rudder, and put his vessel in a better 
trim. He was profuse in thanks, and pressed a small 
bag of pearls on me; which, as it was a plentiful product 
of his island, I accepted. I then promised, if possible, to 
visit his island ; when we cordially embraced, and made 
sail on our different courses. 



CHAPTER XXXVJII. 

Or could say 
The ship would swim an hour, which, by good luck, 
Still swam, though not exactly like a duck. Byron. 

It may be easily supposed, while this 

Was going on, some people were unquiet ; 
That passengers would find it much amiss 

To lose their lives, as well as spoil their diet. Ibid. 

Continually in chase of something, I fell in, among 
other coasting and country craft, with a Chinese junk, 
drifted out of her course, on her return from Borneo. 
She looked like a huge tea-chest afloat, and sailed about 
as well. She was flat-bottomed and flat-sided; decor- 
ations of green and yellow dragons were painted and gilded 
all over her ; she had four or five masts, bamboo yards, 
mat sails and coir rigging, double galleries all round, with 
ornamented head and stern, high as my main top, and was 
six hundred tons burden. Her interior was a complete 
bazaar ; swarms of people were on board, and every indi- 



A YOUNGER SON. 313 

vidual, having a portion of tonnage in measured space, 
had partitioned off his own, and converted it into a shop 
or warehouse; they were like the countless cells of a 
bee-hive, and must have amounted to some hundreds. 
All sorts of handicraft trades were going on, as if on 
shore, from iron forging to making paper of rice straw, 
and glass of rice, chasing ivory fans, embroidering gold 
on muslins, barbacuing fat pigs, and carrying them about 
on bamboos for sale. In one cabin a voluptuous Tartar 
and a tun-bellied Chinese had joined their dainties to- 
gether; a fat dog, roasted entire, stuffed with turmeric, 
rice, suet, and garlic, and larded with hog's grease,, the 
real, delectable, and celebrated sea-slug, or sea-swallow's 
nest, sharks' fins stewed to a jelly, salted eggs, and yellow 
dyed pilaff formed their repast. A mighty china bowl of 
hot arrack punch stood in the centre of the table, from 
which a boy was continually ladling out its contents. Such 
voracious feeders I never beheld ; they wielded their chop- 
sties with the rapidity and incessant motion of a juggler 
with his balls. The little, black, greedy twinkling eye of 
the Chinese, almost buried in mounds of fat, glistened like 
a fly flapping in a firkin of butter. The Tartar, with a 
mouth the size of the ship's hatchway, seemed to have a 
proportionate hold for stowage. Understanding these were 
the two principal merchants on board, I had come to speak 
to them ; but like hogs, buried up to the eyes in a savoury 
waste of garbage, there was no moving them from the 
dainties they gloated on. A sailor, who had conducted 
me, whispered his Tartar owner who I was ; he grunted 
out some reply, and with a greasy paw, placed several 
handfuls of boiled rice on a corner of the table, indented 
it with his fist, poured into the hollow some of the hog's 
lardings out of the platter containing the roast dog, and 
then, adding five or six hard boiled salt eggs, motioned 
me to sit down and eat. 

Driven away by these unclean brutes, I went into the 
Tartar captain's cabin, built over the rudder. He was 
stretched on a mat, smoking opium through a small reed, 
watching the card of the compass, and chanting out, 
" Kie ! Hooe ! — Kie ! Chee ! " Finding I might as well 



S14 ADVENTURES OP 

ask questions of the rudder as of him, I hailed the schooner 
to send a strong party of men. 

We then commenced a general search, forcing our way 
into every cabin, when such a scene of confusion, chatter- 
ing, and noise followed, as I never had heard before. 
Added to this, there were the mowing and gibbering of 
monkeys, apes, parrots, parroouets, bories, mackaws, hun- 
dreds of ducks, fish- divers, pigs, and divers other beasts 
and birds, hundreds of which were in this Mackow ark. 
The consternation and panic among the motley ship's 
crew, and merchant-passengers, arc neither to be imagined 
nor described. They never had dreamed that a ship, 
under the sacred flag of the emperor of the universe, the 
king of kings, the sun of God which enlightens the world, 
the father and mother of all mankind, could, and in his 
seas, be thus assailed and overhauled. They exclaimed, 
" Who are you ? — Whence did you come ? — What do 
you here ? " Scarcely deigning to look at the little schooner, 
whose low, black hull, as she lay athwart the junk's stern, 
looked like a boat or a water- snake, they wondered at so 
many armed and ferocious fellows, not believing they could 
be stowed in so insignificant a vessel, whose hull scarcely 
emerged from the water. A Hong silk merchant, while 
his bales were handed into one of our boats, offered us a 
handkerchief a piece, but protested against our taking his 
great bales, when we could not possibly have room for 
them. 

A few grew refractory, and called out for aid to defend 
their property. Some Tartar soldiers got together with 
their arms; and the big-mouthed Tartar and his comrade, 
swollen out with their feed of roast dog and sea-slug, 
armed themselves, and came blowing and sputtering to- 
wards me. I caught the Tartar by his mustachios, which 
hung down to his knees ; in return he snapped a musket 
in my face; it missed fire; his jaw was expanded, and I 
stopped it for ever with my pistol. The ball entered his 
mouth, (how could it miss it?) and he fell, not so grace- 
fully as Caesar, but like a fat ox knocked on the head by a 
sledge-hammer. The Chinese have as much antipathy to 
villanous saltpetre, except in fire-works, as Hotspur's neat 
and trimly dressed lord ; and their emperor, the light of 



A YOUNGER SOX. 315 

theunirerse, is as unforgiving and revengeful towards those 
who kill his subjects, as our landed proprietors are towards 
those who slaughter their birds. An English earl told me 
the other day he could see no difference between the crime 
of killing a hare on his property, and a man on his pro- 
perty, arguing that the punishment should be the same for 
both. However, I have killed many of the earl's hares, 
and a leash or two of Chinese in my time, instigated to 
commit these heinous crimes by the same excitement, — 
that of their being forbidden and guarded against by 
vindictive threats of pains and penalties. 

But to return to the junk. We had a skirmish on the 
deck for a minute or two, a few shots were fired, and a 
life or two more lost in the fray. The schooner sent us 
more men, and no further opposition was made. Then, 
instead of gleaning a few of the most valuable articles, and 
permitting them to redeem the remainder of the cargo by 
paying a sum of money, as the rogues had resisted, I con- 
demned her as lawful prize. We therefore began a regular 
pillage, and almost turned her inside out. Every nook, 
hole, and corner were searched ; every bale cut, and every 
chest broken open. The bulky part of her cargo, which 
consisted of camphor, woods for dyeing, drugs, spices, and 
pigs of iron and tin, we left; but silks, copper, selected 
drugs, a considerable quantity of gold dust, a few T diamonds 
and tiger-skins were ours ; and, not forgetting Louis, who 
had entreated me to look out for sea -slug, I found some 
bags of it in the cabin of my late friend, the defunct mer- 
chant. Neither did I neglect the salted eggs, which, with 
rice and jars of melted fat, victualled the ship. I took 
some thousands of these eggs, a new and excellent sort of 
provision for my ship's company. The Chinese preserve 
them by merely boiling them in salt and water till they 
are hard ; the salt penetrates the shell, and thus they w r iii 
keep for years. 

The philosophic captain, whose business it was to attend 
to the navigation and pilotage of the junk, having nothing 
to do with the men or cargo, continued to inhale the 
narcotic drug. His heavy eye was still fixed on the 
compass, and his drowsy voice called out, " Kie ! Hooe ! 
— Kie ! Chee I " Though I repeatedly asked him whither 



316 ADVENTURES OF 

he was bound, his invariable answer was, c c Kie ! Hooe ! — 
Kie ! Chee ! " I pointed my cutlass to his breast, but his 
eyes remained fixed on the compass. I cut the bowl from 
the stem of his pipe, but he continued drawing at the 
reed, and repeating, " Kie ! Hooe ! — Kie ! Chee ! " On 
shoving off, as I passed under the stern, I cut the tiller 
ropes, and the junk broached up in the wind, but I still 
heard the fellow singing out, from time to time, " Kie ! 
Hooe! — Kie! Chee!" 

We had altogether a glorious haul out of the Chinaman. 
Every part of our little vessel was crammed with mer- 
chandize. Our men exchanged their tarred rags for shirts 
and trowsers of various coloured silks, and looked more 
like horse-jockeys than sailors. Nay, a few days after I 
roused a lazy and luxurious old Chinese sow from the 
midst of a bale of purple silk, where she was reclining ; 
perhaps she thought she had the best right to it, as it 
might have belonged to her master, or because she was one 
of the junk's crew, or probably she was the owner herself 
transmigrated into this shape, — there needed little alter- 
ation. I also got some curious arms, particularly the 
musket, or fowling-piece, which, had it obeyed its master's 
intention, would have finished my career. The barrel, 
luck, and stock, are deeply chased all over with roses and 
figures of solid gold worked in. I preserve it now, and it 
has recalled the circumstance by which it came into my 
possession ; otherwise, it might have been driven, like any 
others of greater moment, from my memory by the lapse 
of time, and by more recent events. 



CHAPTER XXXIX. 

Not a star 
Shone, not a sound was heard ; the very winds, 
Danger's grim playmates, on that precipice 
Slept clasp'd in his embrace. Shelley. 

Being now on the south-east side of the island of 
Borneo, and the time for meeting De Ruyter drawing 



A YOUNGER SON. 317 

nigh, I made the best of my way to our rendezvous, a little 
group of islands close to Borneo ; but just as I got sight of 
land, it fell a dead calm, which lasted three or four days, 
during which I lest one of my best men. Slung in the 
bite of a rope, and lowered over the bow, he was nailing on 
a sheet of copper that had become loose from the heads of 
the nails being worn off. I was on deck, and, hearing a 
dreadful noise and scream, I ran to the bow from which it 
proceeded. A monstrous ground- shark had got hold of 
the man's leg, and, while his fins and tail lashed the water 
into a white foam, was tugging to draw the man under 
water. Secured under the armpits with a strong rope, 
and holding on the chain -plates, the man struggled violently 
to save himself. When he saw me, he cried out, "" Oh, 
Captain, save me ! " I hallooed to the men who were 
gathering round, to bring the harpoons and boarding pikes, 
and to lower the stern-boat ; and wdth the promptness of 
sailors, fearless when a comrade is in danger, they attacked 
the monster, A brother of the man even jumped over- 
board, armed with a knife. The foam on the water was 
dyed with blood, and the greedy and ferocious sea-devil 
received many wounds, and was harpooned ere he relin- 
quished his gripe ; but the line, from want of giving him 
scope enough, was broken, and he escaped. Meantime, 
the man, now insensible, was hauled on deck : his leg was 
frightfully mangled, the flesh from above the calf being 
drawn dowm like a stocking, and the bone left bar^e. We 
had a sort of surgeon, whom Van Scolpvelt had picked up 
at the Isle of France, but he turned out to be an idle and 
drunken fellow, though not ignorant. The man died a 
few days after : I suppose his wound was- past the art of 
surgery. 

An unlooked-for death on board a ship makes a great 
and awful sensation. Sailors are as untaught, and have as 
little communication with the enlightened world, as the 
Arabs imprisoned in their deserts. The one studies the 
sea of waters, and the other his sandy wastes, the winds 
and their stars, like magic books, not to be decyphered ; 
and who, ignorant of their causes, can contemplate these 
mysterious powers, daily witnessing their wonderful changes 



318 ADVENTURES OF 

and effects, without becoming superstitious ? Certainly 
not Arabs and sailors, whose firm faith in signs and omens 
is as old and boundless as the sands and sea. It is curious 
that so many superstitions belonging to the sea should be 
general throughout the world ; for instance, seamen of all 
countries and religions, from Lord Nelson, and the Captain 
Pacha commanding the Ottoman navy, to the Mainotte 
corsair and the Arab rais, all think it a dread omen of evil 
to begin a voyage on a Friday, the Moslem's sabbath and 
the Christian's day of the crucifixion. I had begun my 
last voyage from the island near Pulo-Penang on that fatal 
day ; and it is remarkable that the second mate, my country- 
man, and two men, brothers, all admirable sailors and very 
good men, when they heard me give the order to weigh 
the anchor, were dissatisfied, and murmured. I frequently 
laughed at them about it : they always answered, " You 
will see, sir — we are not returned to port yet." It was 
one of these brothers who lost his life by the shark, and 
the other, shortly afterwards, lost his life in as strange a 
manner. 

Becalmed off Borneo, I one day pulled in- shore to look 
at a small bay at the mouth of a river, and then pulled 
some way up the river. We let go the grapnel to dine ; 
and in the cool of the evening the men bathed. The 
brother of the man who lost his life by the shark, an ex- 
cellent swimmer, challenged a Malay (whom I had brought 
as interpreter, in case I met with any of that nation), to 
try which could dive the deeper, and remain the longer 
under water. I was just out of the water, and dressing. 
They plunged in together, and were so long under water 
as to alarm me. At last, up came the dark head of the 
Indian : he was astonished at being beaten, and said the 
white man must be the devil, for no one else could beat 
him. Our anxiety became intense : every eye was strained 
as if its glance could penetrate the deep and turbid stream. 
The unfortunate diver never again appeared. We dragged 
and searched in every possible manner, but in vain. The 
night came on, and compelled us to return to the ship. 

The strange deaths of these brothers, within a month 
of each other, made a strong impression. Matted ve- 



A YOUNGER SON. 319 

getation, or a sunken tree, might have entangled him, or 
the cramp might have paralysed his efforts to rise, — or, 
more probably, the jaws of an alligator. Some, indeed., 
thought that grief at his brother's death, which certainly 
had deeply affected him, made his own death voluntary, 
Their fate threw a melancholy and gloom over the ship's 
crew, beyond what the loss of the greater part in broil or 
battle would have done. 

As we slowly crept along the south-east coast, towards 
the appointed port, the weather was, and had been for a 
length of time, unusually clear and bright, with calm and 
gentle airs. One evening, just before sunset, I observed 
the first appearance of a cloud for many days. Thin 
misty vapours, of a gauze-like transparency, began to 
envelope the mountains to the westward ; and suddenly, as 
the sun disappeared behind them, a bar of bright flame 
shot along their summits, then wreathed itself around the 
dreary dome of the highest peak, and remained there for 
some moments, glittering like a crown of rubies. The 
moon was of a dusky red, the sea changed its colour, and 
was unusually clear and transparent. I started at seeing 
the rocks, the fish, and the shells at its bottom ; we sounded, 
and there were twelve fathoms water. The atmosphere 
was hot and heavy ; the flame of a candle, burning on deck, 
arose as clear as in a vault. I ordered the sails to be furled, 
and the anchor to be let go, as we were evidently drifting 
in shore, determined to get under way with the first ap- 
pearance of wind. I remarked to the second mate, who 
had the watch, cc Well, now we are anchored, the charm 
is broken ; is it not ? v 

The man replied sulkily, "We are not in port yet, 
sir.'" 



320 ADVENTURE9 OP 



CHAPTER XL. 

Hark ! tis the rushing of a wind that sweeps 

Earth and the ocean. See! the lightnings yawn 

Deluging heaven with fire, and the lashed deeps 

Glitter and boil beneath. Shelley. 

The shore nearest to us was low, and appeared like a 
huge swamp, overgrown with monstrous reeds, which 
waved about, though we had not a breath of air. There 
was the abode of wild elephants, tiger s, serpents, and 
fevers. We thought we heard the roar of the tigers in the 
stillness of the night. I watched eagerly for the lightest 
air, to enable us to remove from this dreary spot. The 
country evidently was not habitable for man ; yet, as the 
night advanced, we saw lights flickering about on the 
surface of the morass, like the lights used by fishermen ; 
others were stationary, as from a village. 

There were no clouds visible to leeward, yet not a single 
star shone. At length the lightning began to play about 
the mountains inland. I was sitting with Zela on deck, 
watching these unusual signs, which filled us both with 
melancholy bodings ; and she was telling me what strange 
fires, simooms, and whirlwinds she had witnessed on her 
own wild sands, when, at that instant, I heard a strange 
noise, such as comes before the thunder breaks. " Hush !'' 
I said, ee what is that ? " and sprung on my feet. The blow 
was struck before I had time to turn the hands up, for the 
men were sleeping on deck. We were dismasted. I looked 
aloft, and by the light of the sheet-lightning, saw nothing 
standing but two bare poles. All our loftier spars, yards, 
and rigging were flying away, borne up by the wind, as if 
they had been thistle-down. The sea was all white with 
foam, and flew about, covering us as if under a cataract. 
Our ports, and a great part of the gang-ways, were blown 
clear away ; the gun-bolts were drawn, and the guns broke 
loose. Our little vessel plunged madly into the sea, and 
for a time we were actually under its surface. I grasped 
hold of Zela and the shrouds, and with difficulty retained 



A YOUNGER SON. 32 1 

my grasp against the weight of the waters. The cahle 
parted, or we should inevitably have foundered. 

I first drew my breath on seeing the bow of the vessel 
reappear above the water. I called to the men, but none 
answered, and I thought they were all swept into the sea. 
At length, speechless, panting, and panic-struck, some 
straggling individuals came crawling aft. " Are there any 
men overboard ? " I inquired, and looking anxiously over 
the stern, a voice called to me from the sea, " Oh, 
Captain I" It was clearer far than mid-day; the flashes 
of bright sheet-lightning were without interval, almost 
blinding me. The sea, too, was white as snow, and I 
thought I could distinguish many dark heads feebly and 
vainly struggling in it. The voice that called on me I 
recognised as my favourite Swedish boy's, and fancied I 
saw his desparing and piteous look. 

The fatal blast of the simoom was over. I loosened 
Zela, who had clung to me in agony, and placed her in 
safety, accompanied by the American mate, who had seized 
the helm. Rushing to a light whale boat, lying on the 
gangway — for the one astern was washed away — and 
seeing it had escaped the wreck, I called on the men to 
save their comrades. For a moment they hesitated, 
scarcely knowing if they themselves were saved. I then 
called, by name, some of my own countrymen, and said, 
{c What ! shall our shipmates perish for want of a beat, 
or a rope ? Not a hand to throw them even a rope I Get 
out the boat, and where is Strong ? By Heaven he is 
overboard, or he would not have needed to be called ! 
Heave together, my lads ; — she is afloat ; ■ — now take 
care she don't get adrift or swamp ; — that 's well ; — now 
the four best men on board got into her ; — I'll go with 
you ; — I know where they are ; — come, no more hands " 
(for now all seemed eager) ; <c and you, sir, keep her in 
the wind ; — hoist lights ; — have ropes ready ! " 

We shoved off; the wind had as suddenly lulled as it 
had burst, but the sea was dashing, jostling, and tumbling 
about, like a river where it empties itself into the sea. The 
lightning, too, died away into faint and indistinct flashes, 
and it was dark and awfully gloomy. As soon as we had 

Y 



322 ADVENTURES OF 

drifted astern, we picked up two men, who had saved 
themselves by holding on the drifting spars, which were 
towing astern. We saved two others, floating near them. 
Then, after hallooing, and pulling about in the direction 
where the squall had struck us, in search of the man-of- 
war's-man, my second mate, and the Swedish boy, both of 
whom were certainly missing, and how many more we 
knew not, till we ourselves were in danger of losing our 
vessel, we were compelled to return. 

Wind and rain succeeded, and the night looked horrible. 
It was with infinite toil we neared, and at last got under 
the lee of the vessel, drifting rapidly out to sea. As the 
boat shot up under her quarter, not being fended off, while 
the men were scrambling to get on board the schooner, she 
gave a heavy lurch, swamped the boat, and left me, with 
six others, floating on the sea. I struck out to keep clear 
of any one's catching hold of me. Curses and screams 
were mingled. As we fell into the wake of the schooner, 
shooting from us, I heard the men in her crowding aft, 
and throwing ropes, none of which reached us, and calling 
to us to lay hold of the wrecked spars, but they were lying 
out of our grasp, foul of the bottom of the schooner, and 
to windward, the ship then drifting bodily to leeward. I 
called out distinctly, " A rope, or we are lost ! " for I knew 
that our only remaining boat could not be got out. I 
thought my hour was come, when I perceived something 
white on board the schooner, and heard a voice which 
thrilled through my frame, and arose above the wind, the 
sea, and the cries of the drowning. It exclaimed, " There 
is a rope ! Oh, God ! give it him, or take me ! " The ex- 
treme bite of a small white rope fell almost in my hand; it 
was clutched ; so unerring was the eye that directed, and 
the hand, heart-impelled, that cast it. Zela, that hand 
was thine ! Thy little arm and tiny hand at that moment 
possessed more strength than the sturdiest seaman's, and 
saved five lives which could not have been preserved five 
minutes later. 

I can hardly see the paper I write on ! The long lapse 
of years which have passed since that time, appear but as 
minutes, so vividly is that overwhelming instant graven on 



A YOUNGER SON. 323 

my heart. And oh, blessed angel! have you not since, 
hovering over me in battle, preserved me when I have 
wildly rushed on death (for why should I fear or shun 
what is ?) to reunite myself to you ? And have you not, 
protecting spririt ! turned aside the cowardly assassin's balls 
directed at the heart consecrated to you, and guided them 
through my body, balmed the wounds, mortal to human 
remedies, unclenched the gripe of death when I have felt 
his icy fingers in my breast, and restored me to health by 
most miraculous means ? 



CHAPTER XLI. 

Angela the old 
Died palsy twitch'd, with meagre face deform. Keats. 

But, slave of my feelings, I must go back to my narrative. 
Zela, who had not left the deck (indeed she never did, but 
on compulsion, when I was in danger), witnessed the 
whole calamity. She was, as I have said, of a fearless 
race, and her fragile form contained a spirit almost un- 
earthly. She had pointed to the sailors on board — for 
the eye of love pierces through the darkest night — where 
to throw the ropes ; but, not relying on them, she seized 
on the deep- sea-lead-line, which luckily had no lead bent 
to it, and unreeling a long coil, she ran out on the foot- 
ropes of the main-boom. The man swore she ran on it 
like a spirit. When at the extreme end, she was directed 
by my voice, and threw the coil of line in her hand with 
all her strength. Fearing it might not reach me, she had 
fastened the other end, purposing, in that event, to jump 
into the sea to bring it me ; but finding that I had it, she 
threw the end on board. Four out of the six men with 
me grappled and got hold of it. Being not much thicker 
than whip-cord, it was miraculous that it held us ; but the 
schooner was now getting stern- way on her, so that, other 
ropes being thrown, our safety was insured. Two men 
y 2 



324 ADVENTURES OF 

either entangled in the ropes of the boat, or not being able 
to swim (and it is a fact that very few sailors can swim), 
never rose after the boat was stove. 

Zela rushed into my arms, but spoke not a word. Her 
lips were cold as ice. I seated her down by the Malay 
girl on the hatchway. " Oh, God ! " I cried, as her in- 
animate form was upheld by the girl, " she is dead ! " 

Then the old paramana, Kamalia, who was bedridden 
in the cabin, called out — 

« No ! — Death is indeed come : but not yet for her. 
When next he comes, the noble tribe of Beni-Bedar- 
K'urcish, which is coeval with the sands, is extinct for 
ever ! When the destroying salt wave reaches the root of 
the date-tree of the desert, it dies, and its fruits and leaves 
die too. It is written so by the prophet. I ransom her 
life with mine. I swore, when he took her mother, that 
when he next called on the spirits of our house, he should 
take old Kamalia. Blue fiend ! the prophet heard me, and 
thou must obey him ! " 

These words were followed by a stifling noise, as if the 
poor nurse was drowning. As I knew the cabin had been 
fall of water, though I had forgotten her, I called for a 
lantern, and ordered the Malay girl and two of the men 
to go down and bring the old woman, who had been 
rapidly declining in strength, on deck. There was not a 
dry rag on board ; I could only press Zela to my bosom, 
which was but an icy pillow, and breathe on her eyes ; yet 
I thought I felt symptoms of returning life. The men 
called out from below that the old nurse was dead, stiff, 
and cold as a stone ! 

The water being cleared out of the cabin, I carried Zela 
down, and, when I saw she lived, left her in the Malay 
girl's lap, and hastened on deck. We had enough, in 
clearing the wreck, to occupy our hands and minds till day- 
light, without inquiries into the number of men we had 
lost. The Malay girl's screams recalled me into the cabin. 
I found Zela in what I then believed the convulsions of j 
death. She writhed for a long time in extreme agony, and f 
pain seemed to have restored her senses. Before the 
morning her struggles ceased. She had been seized with 



A YOUNGER SON. 325 

premature labour, and brought a dead child into the world. 
But I was happy, for she lived, I forced her to drink 
some strong hot brandy and water, and she fell into a deep 
and tranquil sleep. Her before cold and pallid brow be- 
came warm and moist, and at that moment she looked so 
exquisitely beautiful, that I gazed on her, spell-bound, still 
throbbing with agitation in reflecting how nearly I had lost 
her, and determining in my own mind that henceforth 1 
would cherish her with tenfold care. 

Fearful, when she awoke, that she might hear of Ka- 
mahVs death, and perhaps see her body, I went to the 
place where the faithful and good old creature lay. I held 
the lantern to her face : it had undergone no change ; a 
mummy that I had seen at the Isle of France, of Cleopatra's 
era, nearly two thousand years entombed, looked not more 
antique than old Kamalia, and it bore as much appearance 
of animal moisture and flesh and blood as did her shrivelled, 
withered, and dried-up remains. The worms were de- 
frauded of their prey. Her livid blue skin covered nothing 
but dry and sapless bones : a pale crimson streak, the last 
small drop of blood, stained a vein on her temple ; a little 
tuft of grey hair, like hoary moss on a withered tree, or 
as if a spider had spun his web on her skull, alone shel- 
tered the bare bone : her arms and body were rigid to 
brittleness. Wrapping her remains in her own barakan, I 
lifted the body, and conveyed it to a separate cabin. She 
weighed no more than a bundle of rushes. I closed her 
stony eye and skinny mouth. 

Daylight was approaching ; a man called out, ec Breakers 
a-head!" — yet we had no soundings. Spite of her crip- 
pled state, the schooner, on which we had now some can- 
vass, went round them, when we saw the surf breaking on 
the sunken rocks. As the day dawned, the weather resumed 
its previous tranquillity: the sun arose in all its bright- 
ness ; a vapoury veil of mist hung over the now distant 
low line of shore from which we had been driven, as if the 
hurricane, like an eagle descending to its nest, was sinking 
to repose in its own desolate region, the abode of everlast- 
ing rain and tempests. This vast and dreary swamp, ex- 
tending deep into the island, occupies more than a hundred 
y 3 



S26 ADVENTURES OF 

miles along the shore,, and is exactly under the equator. 
We had cause to be thankful we were driven, though a 
a wreck, from it, instead of being wrecked on it. The 
builder would not have recognised the schooner. The 
Zaoo Prince would not have exchanged his rotten and 
worthless bark for our now less safe-looking vessel. Bat- 
tered^ dismasted^, and broken, we lay a complete wreck on 
the waters, at the mercy of waves and winds which we 
should have laughed at the day before. Our plunder, and 
great part of our provisions, were damaged. 

Giving the necessary directions, and leaving the deck in 
charge of the mate, I went to my cabin, after having 
mustered the crew. We had lost the second mate, the 
steward, the Swedish boy, and seven men. 

I found Zela still asleep, and, putting chairs by the side 
of her couch, I placed my arms around her waist, pressed 
, er gently to my breast, and fell into a deep sleep. I 
dreamed of undergoing every kind of horrible death ; of 
being torn to pieces by sharks, by tigers, — of suffocation 
by drowning, and of my skull being cracked and crushed 
like a nut between the huge jaws of a crocodile. In my 
struggles to escape, I capsised the chairs, and fell heavily 
on the deck of the cabin, dragging Zela with me. In 
terror she asked what was the matter ! The perspiration 
was pouring down my brow : she wiped my face, and, 
kissing my lips, said, e( You were dreaming, dearest ; and I 
was trying to waken you, for your sleep seemed dreadful/" 

It was some time ere I recollected where I was, and 
could recall the events of the night. Then, overjoyed to 
find Zela recovered, I kissed her a thousand times, and 
shook off my heavy drowsiness and sickness with cold 
water and coffee. 

Retarded by light winds and want of canvass, we were 
four or five days reaching our destined port. Finding De 
Ruyter there with two prizes, our sufferings were instantly 
forgotten, and we brought to, under the grab's stern, sing- 
ing and cheering, as if we had returned from a most pro- 
sperous voyage ; so completely can a ray of joy dispel the 
remembrance of the longest and dreariest sufferings. 

De Ruyter hastened on board, not knowing what to 



A YOUNGER SON. 32? 

think, beholding our crippled and weather-beaten appear- 
ance. " Halloo, my lads I" he said, as he came alongside, 
<f have you cruized to the north pole, and been locked up 
in an iceberg for a hundred years ? " 

" No," I answered, " we have merely turned the 
schooner into a diving-bell, or torpedo, to cruize under 
water." 

" What has happened ? " he said, as, standing on deck, 
his keen eye glanced over the tempest- stricken wreck ; 
(e you have been battling with the simoom ! No human 
engines could have done this. Ha ! and I miss some 
familiar faces ! " For De Ruyter had the gift, which kings 
are said to have, of never forgetting faces. 

He came wondering down in our cabin, and I told him 
our disastrous history. " Well ! " he added, cc you have had 
a miraculous escape. It cannot be helped. We must do 
the best we can to set you to rights again. I hope you are 
all right under water. We have spars enough here ; and 
I can make a shift to supply you with rope and canvass. 
I have been more successful, among a convoy of coasting 
craft in the Straits of Sunda. We dismasted a lubberly 
Company's cruizer, and took two of her convoy, charged 
with naval and military stores and provisions, run them 
into Java, where we sold them and their cargoes to ad- 
vantage. Since which we have picked up two private 
traders on our way hither ; one loaded for Macoa with cases 
of opium, better than dollars, for the markets are high ; 
and the other with oil, coffee, sugar- candy, and sundries. 
You see them both in the port. Besides which, I have 
done some service to the people here, Beajus, or wild men, 
as they are called by the Moors, for which they have made 
me king of the island. Here am I, King Prospero, with 
a thousand Calibans for my subjects ! See, now they are 
bringing wood and water ; and they have shown me — 

* 5 All the qualities o* the isle 
The fresh springs, brine pits, barren place, and fertile." 

. c< What can you mean ? M I inquired. 
' ' Near the uninhabited Tamboe islands, I was surprised 
at discovering a fleet of proas. Taking them to be pirates, 
y 4 



S28 ADVENTURES OF 

I ran in amongst them. They were lying close to the 
shore,, and most of their crews escaped. Some got under 
way, and attempted to get out ; but, with the exception 
of two or three, I compelled them to return ; when their 
crews also jumped overboard, and swam on shore. I 
boarded their boats, and found, as I had predicted, they 
were Malayan and Moorish pirates. They had been to the 
south-east side of Borneo, where they surprised the natives; 
who, as their country is swamped during the rainy season, 
and for some time after, live in floating houses, which are 
moored to trees. They could not escape, for these fellows 
went alongside of them in their shallops, and made pri- 
soners of them, their wives and children, who could neither 
fight nor fly. Then, with their living cargo, they put to 
sea, and had run into the Tamboe islands for water and 
provisions ; when I happily, in turn, and as unexpectedly, 
suprised them, and released the captives, of whom I found 
nearly two hundred in the different proas. These proas I 
placed in their possession, brought them here, and landed 
my Beajus near their own country." 

I must observe, that we were now anchored in a port on 
the south of the island of Borneo, in a bay formed by 
three very small islands, which were not inhabited, nor 
indeed habitable, the largest being less than a mile in cir- 
cumference, and having a scanty supply of water. The 
channel between us and the main was scarcely a mile broad, 
and the passage blocked by an extensive shoal, on which 
the sea was always in an agitated state, and generally 
breaking. The grab lay completely land-locked ; I had 
been beating about some days ere I could discover the place, 
although De Ruyter had been most particular in laying it 
down, with written and minute directions. 

To add to the calamities of the schooner, many of our 
men had been suddenly seized with putrid fever and dy- 
sentery, attributed to the pestilential atmosphere on the 
night when we were anchored off the fatal shore of the 
morass. Some died within four and twenty hours after 
they were attacked; and the instant their last struggles 
were over, we were compelled to throw their bodies into 
the sea, to be rid of the stench exhaling from them, which 



A YOUxS T GER SON. 329 

was insufferable before they died. And all these misfor- 
tunes were imputed to having begun our voyage on a 
Friday ! Every individual in the schooner firmly believed 
in thisj except myself. But superstitions believed in, are,, 
in their effects., truths ; therefore I never went to sea again 
on a Friday. 



END OF THE SECOND VOLUME. 



330 ADVENTURES OP 



VOLUME THE THIRD. 



CHAPTER I. 

A long, long kiss, a kiss of youth, and love, 

And beauty, all concentrating like rays 
Into one focus, kindled from above ; 

Such kisses as belong to early days, 
When heart, and soul, and sense, in concert move, 

And the blood's lava, and the pulse a blaze ; 
Each kiss a heart-quake ; — for a kiss's strength, 
I think it must be reckon'd by its length. Byron 

The Beajus are supposed to be part of the aborigines of 
the immense island of Borneo. They have been driven to 
the interior, which is composed of hills and huge moun- 
tains,, dark, rugged, and precipitous. A chain of these 
mountains approached that part of the island off which 
we lay ; and stretching their roots, as it were, far out into 
the sea, rendered the approach dangerous. Had it not been 
for the little islands, like excrescences or suckers from the 
roots, which sheltered us, we could have found no an- 
chorage there, nor within many leagues. The sea lies on 
both sides, without port or pasturage, while the immense 
morass and high mountains form a barrier inland; so that, 
with the exception of occasional marauders pillaging in 
proas a few scattered villages on a plain bordering on the 
morass, the Beajus here live undisturbed, in consideration 
of a tribute paid to a Malay settlement on the western 
coast. Left to be governed by their own chiefs, they live 
in patriarchal simplicity. Hunting and fishing are their 
principal occupations ; nevertheless they have a sufficient 
quantity of rice, Indian corn, and some other grain, with 
abundance of fruits, roots, and herbs. The rainy season 
begins in April, and continues for more than half the year ; 



A YOUNGER SON. 331 

and on the great morass, the boundary of their territory, it 
rains for ever, with frightful storms, thunder and lightning. 
Nothing living dares to enter, except wild beasts, which 
sometimes prowl thither. It was called the land of the 
destroying power, and believed to be peopled by demons, 
who there prepared all the evils in the world, and then 
directed their flight with them whither they listed. To 
assuage the wrath of these destroyers, the Beajus made 
sacrifices and offerings. They believed in a good and 
greater power, but, as he never did harm, they did not 
attempt to bribe him with offerings, or invoke his clemency. 
Their chiefs were elected by the old people. Every head 
of a family was despotic, and answerable for those belong- 
ing to him. Only for great crimes they were cited before 
a general assembly ; and adultery, in either party, was con- 
sidered the most heinous, and punished with death. 

The good office De Ruyter had done these people was 
not forgotten. Their gratitude knew no limit. The two 
hundred whom he had liberated considered themselves his 
bond-slaves, doing him every service in their power, and 
rejecting payment. Some of them were continually along- 
side, and on board us, supplying fruits, fish, goats, poultry, 
and what else their country produced. They erected con- 
venient huts on the largest of the islands, for our sick and 
maimed, which were numerous in both vessels, under the 
superintendence of Scolpvelt, who always took care to be 
well supplied with medicines. Besides, he was a herbalist 
himself, and devoted his leisure hours to prowling about 
in search of herbs and plants, to distilling, making decoc- 
tions, and gathering balsams and gums, for which Borneo 
is famous. One of the Beajus' canoes was at his command, 
with which he made daily excursions on the coast. 

For some time I was exclusively occupied in refitting 
the schooner ; for which purpose I searched the woods, in 
the country of the Malays, for spars. The difficulty 
was in procuring those which possessed the requisite 
qualities of lightness, strength, and elasticity; for, as to 
timber, there was enough to build fleets. One day, having 
pulled far along the coast, I landed in a small creek, 
within a little valley, inaccessible on the land side, owing 



332 ADVENTURES OF 

to an abrupt mountain, and the number of very high trees, 
undergrown with jungle ; while the bushes and canes were 
so woven together by enormous creepers, that it seemed as 
if nothing larger than a rat could pass. But seeing some 
pines, or a species of fir, which struck me would answer 
my purpose, provided I could arrive at them, I landed with 
Zela, and sent the boat on board to bring the carpenters 
with their tools. Although the schooner lay at some 
distance, the boat had a leading wind both ways, and, 
as she sailed remarkably well, I calculated she would 
return in three hours. 

In the mean time we first examined the spot, to find 
an outlet, but in vain. We then strolled on the margin 
of the sea, in the small space which was open, gathering 
oysters and muscles ; for abutments of overhanging rocks, 
impossible to climb, shut us in on both sides. While 
Zela was preparing coffee, I lay on the rocks, lulled by 
the monotonous waves, the crowing of the jungle cock, 
and the distant voice of the faoo, screaming shrilly in 
complaining notes. All who have mingled in the busy 
turmoil of life have felt the exquisite luxury, for there is 
none like it in the world's enjoyments, the balmy sensation 
while reposing alone, or, doubly sweet, with one loved 
companion, in a sheltered and secluded nook. There we 
can unpack the burthen with which our hearts are loaded, 
by thinking alone, secure from observing eyes, unmocked 
by triumphant pity, or sneering self-conceited friends, — 
those officious prophets who foresee our misfortunes, warn 
us to avoid what is inevitable, and abandon us on finding 
them irremediable, salving their consciences with, " Well ! 
he rejected our counsel, and must take the consequences of 
his headstrong proceedings !'* 

Having finished our coffee, Zela laid her head on my 
arm, and pointed out a white speck on the waters, which 
she said was a canoe, and I contended it was our boat. 
We were betting which it would turn out to be. But, 
that I may not be accused thus early of a propensity for 
gambling, I must record that our stakes were only kisses ; 
so that, whichever it was, boat or canoe, it only made the 
difference between giving and receiving,- — yet a very 



A YOUNGER SON. 333 

great and important distinction there is between giving and 
receiving. Having been accounted learned and proficient 
in this abstruse branch of study, my opinion on this con- 
troverted question may be pronounced decisive. Certainly 
I was indefatigable in my application to the mystery ; and 
had I followed mathematics or astronomy instead of kissing, 
(not that their utility to mankind admits a comparison,) 
Sir Isaac Newton and Napier would have been considered 
but as pioneers in science, clearing the path for my 
superior genius. Some curious arithmetician has demon- 
strated that a man, taking snuff once in ten minutes during 
the day, for the space of thirty years, will have been four 
years perpetually snuffing. Not only did I kiss every ten 
minutes during the day, but all night long, sleeping not to 
be subtracted; so that more than half of my early life was 
dedicated to what I then thought the only thing very well 
worth doing, without grudging or grumbling, purely from 
instinct. I therefore, declaring it was our boat, insisted 
on Zela's kissing me ; but, on nearing us, we perceived it 
was Van's canoe : upon which I was about to pay her 
kisses back again, when I heard a rustling among the 
jungle, and prepared my carbine, being concealed by a 
projection of rock. The faoo came nigher to us, and Zela 
whispered, "Be cautious, — it is a tiger! for that bird 
always gives notice of his approach." 



CHAPTER II. 

Upon a weeded rock this old man sat, 
And his white hair was awful, and a mat 
Of weeds were cold beneath hig cold thin feet 
***** 

Then up he rose, like one whose tedious toil 

Had watched for years in forlorn hermitage. Keats. 

I put a ball, over the large shot, in my carbine, and 
making a rest on the rocks for my gun, I determined not 
to fire till he attacked us ; then, if I missed killing him, we 



334 ADVENTURES OF 

were to swim out to the boat, which was rapidly approach- 
ing. Still, as we were hidden, I hoped we should escape 
undiscovered. Taking my cap off, I peeped over the 
rock ; the rustling noise in the bushes continued ; when, 
to my astonishment, I saw, not a tiger, but a grey, hairy 
old man. He removed the bushes, and, after cautiously 
surveying the place, stooped down, and came out at the 
opening of the little creek. I was about to rise, but Zela 
held me down, and signed to me not to move or speak. 
When he stood up he was the strangest looking figure I 
had ever seen, tall, — lean, and emaciated, not at all re- 
sembling any people within my knowledge. He was 
remarkably long-limbed, and had no other weapon than a 
large club, such as is used by the South Sea Islanders. 
His face was black, with grisly hair, and deeply furrowed 
with wrinkles. His figure seemed bent with age and 
infirmities, yet he walked with long strides over the rough 
ground. There was a wild and sullen malignity of ex- 
pression in his eyes, more like those of a demon than of 
a man. When he came to the margin of the sea, in an 
opposite direction to us, he seated himself on a rock, took 
up a sharp stone, knocked off the limpets and muscles, 
and swallowed them fast and voraciously. After this he 
gathered a large leaf, put a heap of oysters and muscles on 
it, and folded it up. Then, looking towards the sea, with 
his eyes fixed for some time on the boat, he washed his 
hand, and returned, somewhat more nimbly, to the place 
whence he had issued, and disappeared. 

" I'll follow him ! M I cried, and jumped up. 

Zela urged me to forbear ; " For," said she, " he is a 
jungle admee, more dangerous, cunning, and cruel than any 
wild beast." 

" He is alone," I replied, " and surely I am a match 
for him. Besides, I shall find a path which will be 
useful." 

Saying this, I went after him, and discovered, upon 
crawling under the thick kantak bush, a narrow winding 
path, a good deal foot-worn. I heard the grisled old 
savage before me ; and, unseen myself, from time to time 
caught glimpses of him. Several branches of trees, under 



A YOUNGER SON. 335 

which he could not pass without stooping, he beat down,, 
or broke off with a blow of his club. Zela, who could not 
be induced to stay, followed close at my heels. We 
tracked him for a short distance through the wood in 
silence. He then branched off to the right, in the direc- 
tion of the great morass, passed the channel of a mountain 
stream, ascended a bank, and then, coming to a rock 
fifteen or sixteen feet in perpendicular height, he climbed 
up an old moss-grown pine-tree. When he had mounted 
the stem of the tree somewhat higher than the rock, he 
clung with his arms and legs to a horizontal branch ; and, 
as a sailor works himself along the stays of a mast, by 
alternately shifting his limbs, he arrived above the summit 
of the rock, when, suspending his body by his hands, he 
let himself gently down, and walked on. 

We followed in the same manner, cautiously avoiding 
his seeing or hearing us. He crossed a ridge of rocks, 
comparatively open. It was here grew the pine-trees that 
I wanted. There was little or no underwood. The old 
man stopped, and looking attentively at a huge pine which 
had fallen from age, out of which, in its half-decomposed 
prostrate trunk, grew a line of young pines, thus per- 
petuating its species, he appeared to be measuring their 
length with a stick. He pulled up four of them by the 
roots, stripped them of their branches, secured them to- 
gether with a fillet of wire- grass, put them on his left 
shoulder, and proceeded onwards to a small space in which 
were the wild mango and ben ana. He examined the fruit 
of them, and smelt them to find if they were ripe; and 
gathering a plantain, which did not readily peel, he threw 
it away. He now made many turns : we followed him as 
close as we could without risking discovery, till he came 
to an open piece of ground which had been neatly levelled, 
the grass, weeds, and bushes cleared away, and in one 
corner, under the shelter of a remarkably thick and beauti- 
ful tree covered with white blossoms, I observed a neat hut, 
built of canes wattled together. I looked round with ad- 
miration, marvelling at the good taste with which the re- 
cluse had selected a place for his hermitage. On one side 
was a rocky bank, covered with tamarind and wild nut- 



336 



ADVENTURES OF 



meg, perfuming the air. There was an excavation in the 
lower part of the bank, partially screened by three tall, 
straight-stemmed betel-trees, with their shining, silvery- 
white bark ; they shone resplendently beautiful, and looked 
like the graces of the forest. At the back of the hermitage 
was a wild waste of jungle, in which I distinguished tama- 
rind, nutmeg, cactus, acacia, banyans, toon, and the dark 
foliage of the bamboo. 

The old savage, having laid the bundle of young fir- 
trees against his dwelling, stooped down and entered the 
low door on his hands and knees ; for the palmetta-leaved 
roof came down to within two feet of the ground. While 
I was attentively surveying and marking the spot, deter- 
mined on visiting it again, and endeavouring to look into 
the hut, under cover of a thick bush on the margin of the 
cleared space, a rustle among the bushes made me turn my 
eyes to the ground, when I saw the diamond-like eye, 
sparkling from the black square head of a cobra-di-capeila. 
It was crossing the path immediately where Zela stood, 
and seemed to have stopped to gaze at her. Forgetting 
everything but her danger, I shouted out, and caught her 
up in my arms. The snake, without appearing alarmed, 
slowly retreated into the opposite bushes. Zela exclaimed, 
(e Oh ! jungle admeel" 

Placing her down, I turned round, and was startled at 
seeing him advance with his club firmly clenched in both 
hands, and swinging over his head, like a quarter-staff. 
The gaunt old wretch, by the increased malignancy of his 
eye, the grinding of his teeth, and the wrinkles on his 
narrow brow, was evidently proceeding to attack me. My 
carbine, cocked, was in my left hand, but ere I could get 
it to my shoulder, he made one huge stride, and his club 
was descending on my head, when, stepping a pace back, 
I discharged my piece under his left armpit, lodging the 
whole contents in his body. He sprung up into the air, 
and, before I could retire, fell slap upon me. I thought, 
as I fell prostrate, that the brute would certainly finish me, 
and called out to Zela to run to the boat and save herself; 
but she was forcing a boar- spear into his side, and an- 
swered, " He is quite dead ; he don't move ; get up ! " 



A YOUNGER SON. 337 

With some difficulty I extricated myself, and saw that 
my ball had passed right through him, entering his heart, 
as I suppose, which had caused that convulsive spring. 
He bled profusely. 

We then went into his house. It differed little in the 
interior from those of the other natives of the island, only 
it had a greater degree of neatness and appearance of com- 
fort. At one end of it was a partition, very ingeniously 
fastened, as a security, I conjectured, against thieves when 
he was absent. There was good store of roots and fruits, 
carefully spread out to prevent their rotting. It might 
have been mistaken for the abode of a mongrel Scotch 
philosopher. 

Hearing musquets discharged, and voices hallooing, I 
was surprised at finding we were much nearer the sea than 
I had anticipated ; but on retracing our steps, I accounted 
for it, by the circuitous path the jungle admee had taken 
us to his abode. We hastened back to the beach, and 
found Van and his canoe. He had been directed to the 
spot by the ^nen of our boat, which was now drawing 
nigh, induced to come from what they said of it ; then, 
alarmed at not seeing us, together with the report of my 
carbine, he ordered musquets to be fired, 

" Well met, Van I" said I; c c here I have procured you 
a magnificent subject to work upon." I then told him of 
my encounter with the wild man. 

" Where is he ? " exclaimed Van. 

As I led him to the spot, he eagerly followed close at 
my heels, and, when he approached the body, cried out, 
" What ! that ? Why, that is not one of the order Bimana, 
— of the genus homo , or man ; but of the second order> 
Quadrumana, — one of the tribe of Simece, — apes, mon- 
keys, baboons ; — narrow pelvis, lengthened falx, long 
arms, short thumbs, flat buttocks. This, 1 " continued Van, 
as he turned him over, " is an orang-outang ; the first 
fulLgrown one I ever saw, and really very like the genus 
homo. But feel— he has thirteen ribs. There is little 
other distinction between him and you : Buffon says they 
have no sentiment of religion, and what have you ? they 
are as brave and fierce as you are ; and are very ingenious 
z 



S3S ADVENTURES OF 

which you are not. Besides, they are a reflective and con- 
siderate set of beings, and have the best government in 
the world : they divide a country into districts ; are never 
guilty of invasion ; and never infringe on the rights of 
others. All this is because they have no priests, kings, or 
aristocrats. They are ruled by democratic chiefs, go about 
in bodies, build houses, and live well. This one has been 
refractory — a heavy sinner; and see, he is diseased, has 
ulcers and a goitre on his throat. — There are also many 
wounds on his body ; — yes, he has been refractory, and 
doubtless banished from the community of his fellow- 
creatures. 1 11 preserve his skeleton, and present it to the 
chemical college at Amsterdam. It is a rare species." 

Leaving Van to work on the orang-outang we, went to 
examine the timber, and cleared a path to the beach. At 
sunset we returned to our boats, as the place was declared 
by the natives to be infested by tigers and serpents. 



CHAPTER III. 

Millions there lift, at Freedom's thrilling call, 

Ten thousand standards wide , they load the blast, 

Which bears one sound of many voices past, 

And startles on his throne their scepter'd foe. Skelle\. 

Both natives and individuals, possessing qualities most 
particularly to be admired, I have remarked are most ge- 
nerally hated and abused. The mass are exclusively occu- 
pied in loving and benefiting themselves, in slandering 
the characters of others, and extracting something from 
their wealth. All who are ambitious of their good word, 
must lie to them, fool with them, and do with them 
homage : — 

" Desert does nothing ; valiant, wise, and virtuous, 
Are things that walk by without bread or breeches." 

The Malays, scattered about on the sea-coast of India, 
and its finest islands, are, by the general voice, pronounced 



A YOUNGER SON. 339 

to be the most fierce, treacherous, ignorant, and inflexible 
of barbarians ; — 

" Which any print of goodness will not take, 
Being capable of all ill." 

De Ruyter, who had no faith in public clamour, and 
was never biassed by the opinions of others, when it. was 
possible to judge for himself, soon set me right in regard 
to the character of this much abused poepie. I found he 
did them but justice in saying they were true to their 
words, generous to prodigality, and of invincible courage. 
All the attempts of European and Indian kings to subdue 
this people have failed. If any portion of their country 
is wrung from them by superior force, with spirits unsub- 
dued they abandon it, maintaining their unconquerable 
love of personal freedom, and gain a footing by conquest 
in neighbouring states or islands. On the coast of Malabar, 
and the three great Sunda islands, they are the most 
numerous. They are the only people in India who have 
preserved their national character and liberty amidsc con- 
tending powers ; and it arises from their love of liberty 
being greater than their love of any particular spot of 
earth which has chanced to be their birthplace. There, 
w r here they can be free, be it rock or sandy waste, is their 
country. They are simple in their wants, hardy, brave, 
and adventurous : such a race can find few parts of the 
world where they will not contrive to exist. Like the 
cocoa-nut, they are never far from the sea ; and, like the 
Arabs, they are not over-scrupulous in appropriating 
the superfluities of wealthy strangers to their own uses. 
Who that lives in want does not desire to supply himself 
from the rich ? — cowards beg, the cunning pilfer, a brave 
man takes by force. The wealth of India and Asia, ob- 
tained by force and stratagem, is conveyed along the shores 
of the Malays towards Europe ; and they would be the 
most besotted of barbarians, if they did not help them- 
selves to a portion of it. They do so ; and though they 
have been pursued, massacred by thousands, their country 
ravaged, their vessels destroyed, yet their numbers aug- 
ment, and their piracies, as they are called, increase instead 
of being diminished; for their war-canoes are widely spread 
z 2 



340 ADVENTURES OF 

over the Indian Ocean. They have several settlements on 
the western shore of Borneo, which lies very conveniently 
for marauding on the Chinese trade. Portuguese, Dutch, 
English, and others have, from time to time, formed set- 
tlements on various parts of the island, the King of Borneo 
protecting them the while, as the industrious bee is pro- 
tected ; but when they had established a factory, and filled 
it with treasures, they were smoked out, and plundered. 
They are now abandoned to their fate by church mis- 
sionary and merchant militant, the island having no roads, 
few ports, and plenty of swamps, jungle, rivers, and 
mountains. 

The Moorish king, who resides at the capital of the 
island, Borneo Proper, has neither command nor influence 
beyond his own province. Chinese, Macassars, Javanese, 
and adventurers from many other lands, have also esta- 
blished themselves there, and live independently; while the 
Chinese have monopolised most of the trade of the island. 
To return to my friends, the Malays ; — - a settlement of 
these neighboured the part of the coast where we were 
lying; and, as De Ruyter was partial to them, having many 
of that nation in his vessel, we were soon on the best 
terms; for we were weary of the Beajus, a far inferior 
race. 

A Malay chieftain was frequently with us ; and, on our 
expressing a wish for a tiger hunt, he willingly assented, 
though it is not common with them to seek tigers for sport, 
as they merely attack them in their own defence, or to 
preserve their property. For this sport I had long been 
eager ; and, being now in a country in which they most 
abounded, I could hardly restrain my impatience. 

I must observe that, while we were lying here, De 
Ruyter occasionally got the grab under weigh, and went 
out to see if he could pick, up any thing, or gain intelli- 
gence of any thing at sea. Meantime our repairs on board 
the schooner (thanks to my friend the orang) proceeded 
rapidly, as I had found spars. We sometimes made 
hunting parties on shore, to kill deer, wild hogs, goats, 
and, at times, buffaloes, in order to supply our vessels with 
fresh meat, and not to infringe on our sea-stock. Besides 



A YOUNGER SOX. 341 

which, there was an abundance of fine fish on the coast ; 
a party of men was every day sent to haul the scan — so 
that we lived well and free of expense. Rice, coffee, 
tobacco, Indian com, and other grains, we procured, by 
barter, from the natives. De Ruyter's intention was to 
await the sailing of the China fleet homeward bound, and, 
if possible, to attack them. 

Having time on our hands, we were anxious to see the 
interior of the island. We had heard the natives fre- 
quently talk of the ruins of an ancient city, skirting the 
great morass, and that it was the abode of tigers and other 
wild beasts. An excursion to that place was quickly 
planned. We always kept our vessels in the best order, 
and omitted no precaution against surprise, by sea or land. 
In general, either he or I remained in charge of the vessels. 
On the island, where we had landed our sick, we had 
mounted two guns and built a battery, which commanded 
the schooner. All our men were kept constantly employed. 
Discontent, drunken brawls, and, sometimes, quarrels with 
the natives, gave us considerable vexation. But De Ruyter 
was better qualified than any man in the world for the 
service in which he was engaged j for, either by lenity, or 
by severe and summary punishment, he overawed the re- 
fractory, and tranquillised the discontented. He had a 
quick eye to see into the characters of men, and he em- 
ployed great art in controlling them ; a portion of which 
I acquired. 

We now made preparations for our tiger hunt. The 
Malay chieftain was to accompany us, with a party of his 
followers ; and he engaged to supply us with elephants. 
De Ruyter took twenty of the most un tractable of his 
crew, well armed ; and a few picked men out of the 
schooner. 



zS 



342 ADVENTURES OP 



CHAPTER IV 

1 saw a fury whetting a death-dart. Keats. 

Around, around, in ceaseless circles wheeling, 

With clang of wings and scream, the eagle sail'd 

Incessantly, sometimes on high concealing 

Its lessening orbs, sometimes, as if it fail'd, 

Droop'd through the air ; and still it shriek'd and wail'd, 

And, casting back its eager head, with beak 

And talon unremittingly assail'd 

The wreathed serpent, who did ever seek 

Upon his enemy's heart a mortal wound to wreak. Shelley. 

There is more of the spirit of chivalry among the Malays 
than among any other people. They are devoted to war, 
and to its inseparable accompaniment, women ; these, with 
hawking and cock-fighting, formed the principal recre- 
ations of our Malay chieftain. One of the peculiarities 
of his character was a punctilious observance of the 
Malayan code of retaliation, surpassing the Jewish law of 
iC an eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth/' Indeed, I 
doubt whether any thing in the records of the most heroic 
periods of chivalry, when crazy red- cross-knights ran tilting 
among the Saracens, dyeing their yellow sands red, can com- 
pete with our Hotspur of the East. In one of his voyages 
he touched at Batavia, to dispose of a cargo, when under the 
government of the Dutch, who are particular about the 
cleanliness of their houses, but as careless as the Scotch 
in their persons and habits. A Hollander, in his arm- 
chair, with a yard of baked clay, well saturated with the 
essential oil of tobacco, and filled with No. 11. canastre, 
with a pottle of smoky Schiedam, experiences all he can 
imagine of paradise ; and ever careful to avoid polluting 
his dwelling, spits into the street. An unlucky delivery 
of this sort, out of the window of a Dutch house, fell, not 
refreshing as the dew of heaven, on the face of our chief- 
tain as he passed under the dwelling. He sought in vain 
the source whence his defilement sprung, " and passion 
having his best judgment coilied, ,, he drew his creese, and 
ran a-muck through the streets, attacking all he met. 
Many a bayonet of a Dutch sepoy let him blood ; the 



A YOUNGER SON. S4S 

garrison was in arms ; when, after stabbing fifteen or 
sixteen persons, he threw himself into the sea, regained 
his proa, and escaped. 

Another time a vessel from Bombay had anchored off 
the coast where his father was chieftain, who bartered 
with its owner the produce of the country for Birmingham 
musquets, warranted to endure for ever, hatchets, adzes, 
and other tools. Ere the vessel sailed, one of the mus- 
quets, on the first discharge, burst in his father's hands, 
and a piece of the barrel, entering his brain, killed him. 
His dutiful son called together the immediate followers of 
his father's house, boarded the vessed in the night, and 
succeeded in taking possession of her ; when, with his 
own hand, and his father's knife, he severed the heads 
from every individual of the crew, made a funeral pile, 
placed his father's body on it, bedecked with a triple 
crown of thirty heads, and fired it. 

To one of the feats I was witness, on his first day of 
our march. A brutal follower, a Tiroon, acting as mahout 
(conductor) to the little elephant on which Zela was seated, 
while in the rear of the party, made a sign to the sagacious 
beast, as he was passing a wretched man, who came out 
of the ruins of a tank to beg, to kill hirn, The elephant 
did so. I was talking to the chieftain, when Zela's voice 
made me turn round. She pointed to the object, which I 
had not before observed ; it was a foul and hideous leper, 
the body perforated thick as a honeycomb with ulcers, so 
bloated, swollen, and plastered with leaves and filthy rags, 
that it bore no resemblance to a human being, with the 
exception of the face, the lineaments of which were spread 
by the fell disease, and showed that he was thus struck and 
blasted in the dawn of manhood. 

The Tiroon mahout was of a race who delighted in 
shedding blood. They make sacrifices to their gods, and 
to the ladies of their love. No Tiroon can marry until he 
has presented his bride with a gory head, no matter whose, 
friend's or foe's, taken in battle, or pilfered from a sleep- 
ing guest : a head must be the first gift. A fiery lover 
who presents a bouquet of heads to a blushing fair one is 
not to be resisted. I suppose this to be a natural feeling 
z 4 



344< ADVENTURES OF 

among gentle women, as it is a general one, from the 
Roman ladies who viewed in ecstasy the wounds and 
agonies of expiring gladiators, to our modern fair ones, 
who are always to be won by fighting. 

But to return to my friend the chieftain. As soon as 
he was made acquainted with the wanton murder com- 
mitted by the Tiroon on the outcast and despised leper, 
he seized on a mahout's stick, and began beating him with 
it. The wild Tircon drew a poisoned arrow from his belt, 
and attempted to stab his chastiser, who, on seeing it, be- 
came infuriated. He struck the arrow from his hand, 
drew his own creese, forced the fellow back against a tree, 
held him there in an erect posture with his left hand, and 
continually stabbed him with the weapon in his right, 
even long after life was extinct. His fury was inde- 
scribable ; and himself, covered with the Tiroon's blood, 
glistening on his raven hair and fiery face, looked like an 
avenging demon. 

I said to De Ruyter, who had drawn near me, ic My 
carbine must be in readiness; — the fellow is mad with 
rage, and will be running a-muck here." 

The chieftain, wearied with stabbing, cast the mangled 
body of the Tiroon beside the leper ; then looking up to 
the air, he gave a yell of delight, pointed his crimsoned 
creese upwards, and exclaimed, ie There they are — Did I 
not say so ? " 

Looking up, I saw a long- winged haggard hawk, of th 
largest species, battling with a raven, which had been 
attracted by the scent of blood to the spot where we were. 
His watchful foe had espied him, and taken the field 
against him. The chieftain averred the hawk was the 
leper's spirit, the raven the Tiroon's, and watched the 
conflict with intense interest. Both, wheeling upwards, 
ascended till they were scarcely distinguishable. They 
looked no bigger than the motes in a sun -beam ; but the 
eagle-eyed chieftain vociferated, " Now the leper is up- 
permost, and is descending on the spirit of his black 
assassin ! " 

The hawk, having in spiral motion achieved the upper 
flight, fell like a thunder-bolt on the raven, stunned him 



A YOUNGER SON. 345 

with the blow, clutched him in his talons, folded him in 
his wings, and, the hawk undermost, they tumbled down 
like a black ball, till within a short distance from the earth. 
The hawk then unfolded his wings, but loosened not his 
talons till close to the ground, when the force of the air, 
acting on the wings, brought the hawk uppermost, and 
the raven fell on the earth motionless, but, as it seemed 
by his low harsh croaking, not quite dead. The chieftain 
clapped his hands, went to the spot close by the dead 
bodies, took up a stone, and smashed the raven's scull. 
The hawk took flight, and perched triumphantly on the 
top branch of a very high tree, and appeared as if awaiting 
our departure to begin his feast. 

Under the conduct of this fiery chieftain we had placed 
ourselves. I must remark that the issue of the battle 
perfectly tranquillized him ; and we resumed our march in 
harmony. With the exception of these gusts of passion, 
he was kind-heated, courteous, affable, and exceedingly 
attentive to us his guests. He had great natural sagacity 
in overcoming every difficulty which impeded us, held 
his followers in complete subjection, and took every pre- 
caution not to be surprised by the people through whose 
districts we were passing. His instincts were exquisitely 
acute from constant exercise, as the civilised are dull from 
want of use. He could distinguish objects correctly ere 
our eyes could reach them ; and his hearing was quicker 
than a dog's. Our progress, however, was slow; the 
elephants were often compelled to clear us a path through 
the jungle, and we lost entire days in searching for passes 
round or through the swamps, and pathless forests. There 
were few signs of the abodes of man, and there was neither 
corn nor culture ; but we had an ever- varying succession 
of beasts and birds. 



3^6 ADVENTURES OF 



CHAPTER V. 

There the large olive rains its amber store 

In marble fonts ; there grain, and flower, and fruit, 

Gush from the earth until the land runs o'er ; 

But there too many a poison-tree has root, 

And midnight listens to the lion's roar, 

And long, long deserts scorch the camel's foot, 

Or heaving whelm the helpless caravan, 

And as the soil is, so the heart of 'man. Byron. 

During the heat of the day, and in the evening, while 
lying by, we practised with single ball on deer, wild hogs, 
and wild peacocks, which last flew over our heads in 
thousands, to seek their roosting places in the woods. On 
the fifth day we drew near our sporting-ground, on the 
south-east side of the island. While in this neighbour- 
hood, De Ruyter cautioned us to smoke incessantly ; and 
knowing its efficacy, I made Zela smoke a small hooka. 
My argola was never allowed to go out ; I was mounted 
on a huge dromedary, and the mahout, on the animal's 
neck, carried a pot of live charcoal, and an ample sack of 
tombackie. During this excursion I witnessed the ad- 
mirable effects of tobacco as a preventive against fever. 
All those who did not use it suffered from fever, giddiness, 
vomiting, spitting of blood, and dissentery. Even those 
who were not accustomed to it, and could only be induced 
to occasionally smoke a cigar, had slight attacks of fever. 
Chewing the weed appeared of little service. The hooka 
and callian, by continually exciting the action of the lungs, 
as the smoke must be drawn down to the chest, were 
effectual preservatives. Then, if possible, we avoided 
sleeping under trees, or near jungle. The Malays always 
cut down the jungle, and set it on fire ; which both cleared 
the ground, and purified the atmosphere. 

We left the woods, and came to a large extent of plain, 
with nothing on it but enormous reeds, grass, and nau- 
seously smelling weeds, that grew as high as young fir trees, 
mingled thickly with rattans. Paths had been cleared by 
wild elephants, which enabled us to pass this otherwise 



A YOUNGER SON. 347 

impenetrable wilderness. It was bound by mountains, 
forests of the most stupendous trees I had ever beheld^ 
and, on our right, by a low ridge of rocks, in which 
direction we bent our course. From the centre of this 
ridge there arose a mound of earth, like a green island ; 
and the ridge of rocks branching out on each side, looked 
like piers built to connect it with the mountains. On this 
spacious mound were said to be the ruins of an immense 
Moorish city, once called the city of kings, — but now the 
city of the tigers. The plain was called the plain of the 
elephants. 

We followed the elephants' tracks for many a weary 
mile, and saw elk-deer and other animals, but no elephants. 
At last we came to the ridge of rocks., and, having ascended 
them, we looked down on a black and fetid morass which 
extended further than the eye could reach, and lay con- 
siderably lower than the plain which we had crossed. 
The green and wooded hill, to which we were bound, 
was still a day's march from us. There was a terrible 
gloom hanging over the black swamp : nothing grew there 
but dark marsh-reeds, with high and silky tufts of sooty 
black, which waved to and fro, like the nodding plumes 
upon a hearse, though there was not a breath of air where 
we stood. It indeed looked like the murky abode of all 
evil ; and when the night came, and the land-wind arose, 
and swept over it, illumined by faint, pale-blue lightning, 
it seemed like a black and agitated sea beneath us. I 
thought how nearly I had been cast on it, and doomed to 
inevitable destruction. 

After having been threatened with a locked-jaw from 
tearing and tugging at a half-roasted wild peacock, I lay 
down in my tent on a tiger-skin, and put my carbine 
under my head, while Zela nestled by my side, and drew 
a tanned elk-skin over us. I slept better than those 
lodged more luxuriously, till towards morning, when I 
was with difficulty awakened by Zela. Owing to the wild 
and perilous life she had led from her infancy, she could 
awake at the smallest noise from the deepest sleep. I 
have seen her open her eyes at the musquito which I had 
prevented from alighting on her brow, as it flew, humming 



348 ADVENTURES OF 

in anger round her head. This night she was awakened 
by a rustling sound, and, seeing my legs were bare, was 
about to cover them, when she perceived a large venemous 
serpent move from under the skin, and leisurely crawl 
over my stretched-out legs. Fortunately, I slept like 
death, and felt it not. She had presence of mind, lay 
leaning on her arm, held her breath, and watched its 
motions by the light of the lamp, and the glowing embers 
of a tire, at a little distance from the tent door, as a pre- 
ventive against the foul vapours of the morass. The 
serpent, attracted by the heat, had left its cold bed among 
the rocks, and passed directly towards it. Had I made the 
slightest motion, or had she then given the alarm, it would 
have wounded me, and mortally. When it was a few 
yards from the tent, she aroused me ; and the instant I 
was made sensible of the danger, I jumped up, fearful 
that some of the people sleeping without might be attacked. 
I bade Zela awaken those on the side of the tent, and 
followed the serpent, which was gliding onwards. It 
heard my approach, erected its crest, and looked back at 
me. My carbine was loaded with large shot, and, being 
close to it, I lodged the contents under its head. A man 
sleeping close to the spot, sprang up, and then fell prostrate : 
I thought I had killed him. 

The chieftain gave the alarm, and rushed towards me 
with his followers. I pointed to the writhing monster, 
struggling amidst the embers. At the report of the gun^ 
he had anticipated a battle of some sort ; but when he saw 
what it was, he appeared disappointed, and said, " Pshaw ! 
it is only a chickta ? It is wrong to waste powder, and 
awaken people, to kill troublesome worms ! Why, there 
are thousands of them here. This is the way to kill 
them ! " At which he struck his spear through its 
head, and held it in the embers. The snake wound its 
body round and round the shaft till its tail came near his 
hand. The chieftain then unfolded it, and said, " If you 
like to hold it here for ten minutes, till well roasted, you'll 
find it excellent eating ! '* 

When dead, he dropped it into the fire, covered it 



A YOUNGER SON. 349 

with the ashes, and saying, " We'll breakfast on it/' 
returned with the others to their sleep. 

De Ruyter, Zela, and myself, not desirous of being again 
disturbed by such troublesome interlopers, sat by the fire, 
and talked the night away. Our conversation, after a 
while, veered round from the frightful and supernatural 
aspect of the scene of our encampment, to tiger-hunting. 
De Ruyter, who had a strong passion for the sport, and 
had been celebrated for his exploits in the upper provinces 
of India, said, — 

" Tiger-hunting, as practised in India, is little better 
than killing cats ; nor are there so many risks attending it 
as in fox-hunting. The sportsmen, and there are gene- 
rally twenty of them, with twice that number of elephants, 
encaged in the houdahs, each of them having half a dozen 
loaded double-barrelled guns, charged as fast by servants as 
they can be fired, are perched in the same security as if on 
a tree, deer-shooting. A mahout sometimes gets a scratch, 
but it is the noble elephant that bears the brunt of the 
battle, and every thing depends on his sagacity, courage, 
and steadiness. If he won't stand, becomes frightened, 
and goes off, then, indeed, the sportsman's life is in some 
jeopardy ; for a mad bull, or our Malay running a-muck, 
is nothing to a helpless elephant." 



CHAPTER VI. 

Cedars, and yews, and pines, whose tangled hair 

Is matted in one solid roof of shade 

By the dark ivy's twine. At noonday here 

'Tis twilight, and at sunset blackest night Shelley. 

The brindled lioness led forth her young. 

That she might teach them how they should assuage 

Their inborn thirst of blood. Ibid. 

<£ Bdt hunting lions on foot," continued De Ruyter, " or 
lions hunting by themselves, is a noble sight, as I once 
witnessed. Unlike the crouching and dastardly tiger, they 



S50 ADVENTURES OF 

do not lie in ambush to suprise their prey at night, but 
take the field with the dawn — drag cover, and give chase 
to the first animal that breaks it, be it what it may, while 
the forest trembles with their thundering voices. I had 
been to meet a prince of the family of Bulmar Singh, near 
Rhotuk, in the neighbourhood of which I was detained 
some days, attended by a small body of followers, with 
half a dozen of the little mountain-elephants, on a march 
towards Kamoon, the country of the Himalaya Moun- 
tains, inhabited by a wild race called Silks. We went by 
secret and circuitous paths through an immense tract of 
country, covered with forest trees and jungle. I never 
lived so long without seeing the sun as when toiling 
through that dreary world of shade. Not a ray could 
have penetrated it since the creation. Even the winds, 
wandering vagrants as they are, could find no entrance 
there. In that everlasting twilight, great owls and vam- 
pyre-bats gambolled about all day long, like swallows in 
spring. The birds and beasts, which were very few, 
lacked their natural dyes to distinguish them, all partaking 
of the monotonous hue of the yellow, mossy, and mouldy 
trees and plants. Fauns, hares, foxes, and jackals were 
of a brindled gray. There were toad-stools and fungi 
grouped in knots, which in colour and size so closely 
resembled lions couching with their cubs, that we, know- 
ing they abounded there, prepared to defend ourselves. 
Parasitical creepers, gasping, like myself, for air, had 
plunged their wiry roots in the deep, dingy, vegetable soil, 
till their trunks swelled to the bulk of the teak tree, up 
which they had climbed to redden their heads and spread 
their scarlet flowers in the sun ; then, as if to monopolise 
all, they extended themselves on the tops of the highest 
trees, fanned by the air, and basking in sunshine. Oh, how 
I envied them ! 

u You have seen this en a smaller scale : imagine, 
then, my delight when I, accustomed from my youth to a 
boundless expanse of sea and sky, left this gloomy twilight, 
and burst from the belt of death — for so it is properly 
named — into broad, open, unobscured light. I blinked 
like the owl in the sun, shouted in ecstasy, and respired 



A YOUNGER SON. 351 

the free air as you did when you emerged from your 
plunge off the frigate's yard-arm. The scene looked 
like a lake fenced by a forest. To the east, the mountains 
arose to a stupendous height : they bordered the Chinese 
empire. There was a clear stream winding through this 
narrow and beautiful valley. After crossing it, we came 
to the bed of a mountain-torrent, deep, and of great 
breadth, but at that time dry, with the exception of a few 
pools of water. In the middle of this bed of gravel, in- 
terspersed with pieces of rock* was a small island formed 
by a rock, and enlarged by fragments which had been 
brought down by the torrent, and which adhered to it in 
natural arches, overgrown with moss, flowers, and shrubs. 
The security of the position, added to its beauty, tempted 
us to make it our place of halt and repose. I was then 
young and romantic as you are, and, after passing through 
the dreary gloom of the forest, thought I could have 
dwelt there all my life. The night was clear and bright, 
and long before it was day, I was up smoking my cailian, 
and planning a shooting bungalo. 

(C The transition from night to day came on so gently, 
that I did not notice it ; yet, in the forest, I could see it 
was midnight. A herd of wild buffaloes, the largest I had 
ever seen, came out to graze within a little more than 
musket- shot from us. Suddenly I sprang on my feet at 
hearing a confused noise, like the rumbling of a thunder- 
storm, or distant guns at sea, The woods seemed in 
motion ; jackals, foxes, and dappled deer came bounding 
out of the forest ; the herd of black buffaloes ceased to 
graze, and turned towards the place whence the noise pro- 
ceeded. A large flock of glittering peacocks, and other 
birds, flew screaming over our heads. A pelican that I 
had watched making prize of a snake, dropped it within a 
yard of my feet, and flew away. Our little wire-haired 
elephants, feeding on the shrubs beneath us, looked ter- 
rified, and their keepers left them, and crawled up the 
rocks. I watched the opening in the dark forest, which 
was half screened by thick and thorny bushes, when pre- 
sently a mohr of the elk-kind burst cover, and, with one 
long, magnificent bound, appeared in the plain. In his 



352 ADVENTURES OF 

stature he was far beyond those which are known in 
Europe, and his twisted horns were long as that Malay's 
spear. At the same instant, a single, clear, deep, terrific 
roar, like a burst of thunder, announced the hunting lion. 
He forced his way through bush and briar, with his nose 
to the ground, followed by four others. On entering the 
plain, he seemed for some moments endeavouring to catch 
the scent in silence, his nose always to the ground. Having, 
as it appeared, hit it, he again gave a roar, which was now 
echoed by all the others ; and, pursuing the track of the 
stag, he started off at a long gallop, the rest following close 
in a line at his heels. I remarked, if any of them at- 
tempted to break the line, or pass him, he checked them 
with his voice, which became deeper and more growling. 

" The elk, taking the upper ground, went at an eagle's 
speed along the margin of the river, leaving the lions far 
behind. In attempting to leap the river from a ledge of 
rock, the opposite bank gave way, and he rolled in ; then, 
wading down, he stopped an instant, as if to breathe and 
brace his limbs, the voices of the lions now in full chorus 
nearing him. He ascended a slope, and, crossing, came 
towards us in the deep, dry channel of the torrent. 

" I should have observed that the leading lion, when 
he passed through the herd of buffaloes, took no other 
notice of them than as they appeared to have puzzled him 
in regaining the scent of the stag. The buffaloes stood 
their ground, without budging to make way for the lions, 
as if fearless of attack ; and my guides assured me these 
animals are more than a match for the fierest lion, and 
that any one of them could kill two or three tigers. How- 
ever that may be, as the lion passed through the line of 
these huge oxen, his grisly and erect mane, and shaggy 
tail, waved above them. It was clear he hunted by scent, 
and not by sight; instead of crossing the river in the 
nearest direction to where the stag now was, he nosed him 
to the spot where he had leaped, then wading to the 
opposite bank where the stag had fallen, he also followed 
the course of the stream, ascended the slope, and, ever in 
track of his prey, crossed into the torrent's bed. 

" In all probability the poor stag had received some in- 



A YOUNGER SON. 35fi 

jury from his fall. His speed decreased, whilst that of 
the lions was augmented, and their voices grew louder as 
they neared the chase. The stag had passed the rocky 
ledge on which I stood, soon followed by the full pack. 
I had a good view of them : the first was an old gaunt 
brute, his black skin shining through his thin, starred, 
reddish hair j his tail was bare and draggled, and the hair 
on his mane was clotted together ; his eyes looked dim and 
bloodshot ; his huge lower jaw was down, and his tongue 
hung out like a wearied dog's. He, however, kept the lead, 
followed by a lioness, and three male cubs, almost fully 
grown. The stag now made attempts to ascend the bank, 
as if to regain the jungle ; but the loose shingle gave way, 
and he lost much ground. He seemed also, as the chase 
gained on him, to be panicstruck by their roars ; and, 
again falling when he had ascended three parts of the 
steep acclivity, he was unable to rise. The roaring of the 
lions was magnificent, as the head one, erecting his mane, 
and lashing his sides with his tail, bounded in on him with 
a mighty spring. Then with one paw on his body, he 
growled the others off, and leisurely began his breakfast, 
his family stealing aside with limbs and fragments which 
he tore away and scattered about. 

" But here comes our wild Malay chieftain ; so finish 
your coffee, and let us be moving to the city of kings, — 
or of wild beasts, — for they are too often the same. What 
glorious sport it would be, to hunt tigers with the souls of 
tyrants within them I" 



CHAPTER VII. 

Amid the desolation of a city 
Which was the cradle, and is now the grave 
Of an extinguished people, so that pity 
Weeps o'er the shipwrecks of oblivion's wave 

The tigers leap up ; 
A loud, long, hoarse cry 
Bursts at once from their vitals tremendously. Shelley's MS. 

As we approached the hill, there was an undulating ground, 
the soil red; with low jungle, bearing red and yellow berries 

A A 



354 ADVENTURES OF 

in profusion. Bustards, large flocks of cranes, herons, and 
sea-birds were in the air. Jackalls, foxes, and several 
animals I had not seen before, crossed our path. We had 
glimpses of herds of wild elephants and buffaloes, grazing 
on the plain we had passed. At noon we were stopped by 
a river, broad, muddy, and shallow, which doubtless floods 
the upper plain during the rainy season ; that is, for seven 
or eight months during the year ; it then must force a 
passage into the morass below. After being a long time 
detained, the elephants forded it, when we rested for the 
night ; or rather we did not rest, for we were so tormented 
with stinging vermin that none of us could sleep. The 
next day we ascended (as it is called) the Haunted Hill ; 
which the natives hold in such superstitious awe, that, in 
all probability, we were, for centuries, the first who had 
disturbed the hallowed precincts of ogres and spirits, con- 
fidently reported to reside there. Remnants indeed there 
were of a city of some sort. De Ruyter said they were 
Moorish. There were large masses of stone, choked-up 
tanks, and indications of where wells had once been, but 
almost entirely concealed by thick bushes, dank weeds, 
creepers, and other vegetation, flourishing in profusion. 
Wherever it was penetrable, it bore the footprints of so 
many wild animals, that there was enough to check the 
hitherto insatiable thirst of dry and musty antiquaries. 

We pitched our tents on a rocky part of the hill free 
from jungle, lighted fires, roasted a young stag, commenced 
arrangements for the morrow's sport, and slept. Before 
the dawn, the restless Malay chieftain was calling up his 
followers, and preparing the elephants, of which he had 
six. Soon after it was light, every thing was in readiness, 
and we set forward. Zela, who insisted on accompanying 
us, was mounted on her small elephant, and encaged in 
the only covered houdah, ours being all open. We beat 
about in vain ; for though we met with tigers' footmarks 
in many of the open places, near pools of standing water, 
the high grass and thick bushes prevented our tracing them 
to cover. We found, however, abundance of smaller 
game ; deer, wild hogs, and a variety of birds. De 
Ruyter having carefully surveyed the neighbourhood, 



A YOUNGER SON. 355 

came in at night, and told us he had tracked three tigers 
to a thick jungle, near which he had found the bones 01 
an ^Ik-deer, recently killed by them. 

With this promise of sport, we started in the morning 
in great glee ; and, as we thought, well prepared for the 
attack. After riding about two miles, we descended to 
the plain, and came to an exceedingly thick jungle, with 
thorny bushes and canes. Around us was the plain 
covered with very high jungle grass, and dank weeds, 
with bushes scattered here and there, but few timber trees. 
De Ruyter conducted us to the spot where he had dis- 
covered the stag's bones, surrounded by moist and torn-up 
earth, and trampled grass ; thence we had no difficulty in 
tracing the tiger's huge paws into the patch of jungle. 
Here De Ruyter divided our party, so as to block up the 
only apparently accessible outlets, made by wild beasts ; 
and by these openings we were to enter. The greater 
proportion of our party was on foot, and seemingly as un- 
concerned as if going in to hunt weasels, I left Zela, seated 
in her houdah, at the opening of the wood, guarded by 
four of her own Arabs. 

De Ruyter and myself dismounted to clear a passage ; 
the Malays were divided into two parties; and we were 
backed by our sailors, whom we cautioned to be careful in 
the use of their fire-arms, as more was to be feared from 
accidents with them, than from the tigers. De Ruyter 
expressed great doubts of our elephants facing the tiger, 
but it was necessary to try them. In our progress towards 
the bushes we turned out many deer, hares, and wild cats. 
We saw also ruins, said to be those of a Moorish palace. 
Nothing but the sagacity of the elephants could have 
steered us clear of broken masses of buildings, chasms, 
and wells overgrown with dank verdure. It was a wild 
and haunted-looking place, which awed even the sailors in 
their boisterous mirth, and silenced the ribaldry and ob- 
scene threatening of the Malays. The low trumpeting 
sound and foot-stamping of our elephants gave notice that 
the tiger's den was near. A vaulted ruin was before us ; 
there was a rustling amongst the bushes ; De Ruyter said, 
iC Bs steady, my lads !" and a tiger, the first I had ever 

A A 2 



856 



ADVENTURES OF 



faced, finding his passage blocked up, charged us. We 
fired together, I know not with what effect ; for both our 
elephants slued round, and ran away wild with fear. My 
mahout threw himself off, and a branch of a tree struck 
me off. I heard a tremendous war-whoop, and fire kept 
up on all sides. De Ruyter's elephant fell into a half- 
choked well ; but, with his wonted self-possession, he ex- 
tricated himself. 

Leaving the elephants to their fate, we determined not 
to lose the sport. De Ruyter thought there were more 
tigers in the den, and we went on foot to drive them out. 
We got some of the men together, and proceeded to the 
spot, to which we were directed by the abominable stench, 
and the dried bones scattered about. The bushes were 
cleared away, and we heard, as we drew near, back to 
back, forcing our way onwards, low muttering growls and 
sharp snarls. " Stand close ! " exclaimed De Ruyter ; 
cc there is a tigress with her whelps ; — have a care ; — 
don't fire, my lads, till she breaks cover, and fire low.'' 

A whelp, three parts grown, first came forth to charge 
us. De Ruyter, expecting the old one would follow, reserved 
his fire, and cautioned me to do the same. The whelp 
looked frightened, and slunk away, crouching under a 
thick bush, where it remained snarling, and thither the 
other whelps followed. The mother's growl became ter- 
rific ; a shot at one of the whelps brought her out, lashing 
her sides, and foaming with rage. She rushed right on 
us; I fired both barrels; we then retreated a few paces. 
The wounded brute staggered after us; and when rising to 
spring, De Ruyter, who had still reserved his fire, shot 
her right through the heart. While I was charging my 
gun, one of the whelps, already wounded, drove against 
me, and knocked me down ; when De Ruyter, with as 
much coolness as if he had been pigeon-shooting, put his 
rifle to his ear, and almost blew its head off. Meantime 
the sailors kept up a fire, till the balls were flying about 
our heads, on the remaining whelps, which were stealing 
away wouuded. " Let us stand behind this rock/' said 
De Ruyter ; u a sailor uses a musquet as he does a horse, 
— he bears down all before him." 



A YOUNGER SON. 557 

A Malay came from the chieftain to tell us the other 
part of the jungle was alive with tigers — that they had 
already killed two, and that one of their men was dead. 
There was now as much noise and confusion as in a naval 
battle, or at the sacking of a city. I observed, however, 
that tigers were not such formidable opponents as I had 
imagined. They lay close and crouching in the long grass, 
or under the bushes, and were as difficult to get up as cats 
or quail. It generally required a shot to move them ; then 
they always essayed every means of escape through the 
thickest cover; and it was only when finding every passage 
blocked up, and smarting from wounds, that they rushed 
blindly and madly on their pursuers, forced by despair, 
like a cat or a rat. With nerve and self-possession, two 
men with double-barrelled guns would have little to fear, 
and might boldly go up to the mouth of the den of a 
tiger. This piece of thick jungle, interspersed with 
caverns, rocks, and ruins, plenty of water near, a great 
plain covered with high jungle-grass, and well supplied 
with a diversity of smaller animals to prey upon, was a 
favoured abode for tigers ; and had they been endowed 
with reason, they could not have selected a spot on the 
island so admirably adapted for their residence, while 
their number and size indicated how well they thrived 
there. A great many escaped on the plain, where it v/as 
impossible to follow them. Several of our men were badly 
mauled by them, and more by falls : one of the Malays 
had his spine so injured, that he died in great agony. 



CHAPTER VIII. 



And each hunter, panic-stricken, 
Felt his heart with terror sicken, 
Hearing the tremendous cry. 



• Former years 



Arise, and bring forbidden tears. Shelley. 

Uneasy at my long absence from Zela, I went alone (for 
all our people were scattered) to the entrance of the wood, 

A A 3 



358 ADVENTURES OF 

where I had left her guarded. As I approached the place, 
I was alarmed at a mingled noise of tigers, elephants, and 
screaming voices. I hastened on as fast as the thick cover 
and broken ground would permit. The fierce snarlings 
of tigers became louder. I passed the spot where I had 
left Zela, burst through the cover wildly with terror, and, 
on getting to the open space, beheld a monstrous tiger on 
the back of her elephant, clinging with his huge claws 
on the houdah, gnashing his teeth, roaring, and foaming 
with rage. Zela not visible, methought he had devoured 
her ! I struck my head with my clenched hand, exclaim- 
ing, " Fool ! fool ! " and for a moment staggered un- 
nerved, while a deathlike sickness came over me ! It 
was but a moment : my blood renewed its course through 
my veins like flame ! My carbine not being charged, 
I cast it from me; and, armed with nothing but a 
long Malayan creese, fierce and fearless, I rushed by a 
half-grown limping tiger-whelp, whining and gnawing at 
something, which I passed unheedingly. The elephant 
was stamping, squeeling, and struggling desperately to 
shake off his enemy. The grisly tiger fell ; but within his 
gripe he held a human victim, bent up, and enveloped in a 
white cotton garment, such as Zela wore. As I came 
within a few paces of the tiger, holding his victim down 
with a paw upon his breast, he glared ferociously on me. 
While I was rushing in on him, a voice above me, faint 
and tremulous, said, "Oh, Prophet, guard him!" I 
heard no more — ^ I was madly striking out my arm, to 
plunge the weapon in the tiger's throat, while he was in the 
act of springing on me. The elephant, as if Zela's prayer had 
been heard, struck the tiger, while his eye was fixed on me, 
with his hind foot, sent him reeling many paces, and, ere 
he could recover, I had plunged my creese up to the 
hilt in his body. A loud shout, drowning the cries of 
tiger, elephant, and all others, now burst on my ear, and 
the Malay chieftain came up, in good time; for so tena- 
cious of life is the tiger, that he was still enabled to strike 
me down with his paw, and as the whelp had come on 
me, I should have been torn to pieces but for the chief- 
tain's timely aid. He thrust his spear through the 



A YOUNGER SON. 359 

whelp, and buried his dagger twenty times in the body of 
the tiger; then, dragging the lifeless brute from above 
me, he helped me up, and said, " Yes, this is very good 
amusement — I like it! Let's go into the jungle again — 
there are plenty more of them, and we'll kill them all !" 
Upon which, roaring like a lion, and reeking with sweat 
and blood, he shook his spear, and darted into the wood 
again. 

My wild and vacant eye fortunately fell on the form of 
Zela, who was clinging speechless at my feet, or I should 
have died or gone mad. I endeavoured to raise her, but 
my strength had left me. I staggered and fell, clasping 
her, when for a time I was almost insensible. Recovering, 
I beheld her safe, saw the dead bodies of the tigers, and 
found all was quiet near us. 

cc What is that ? " I asked, pointing to the bundle of 
white rags which lay close at my feet. 

(C That, dearest, is the poor mahout — I fear he is 
dead!" 

(C Oh, is it only he ! I thought it had been you, and 
that you were now but a spirit, my elected good one ; for 
you know, by my new Arab creed, I am allowed two, a 
good one and a bad one." 

My rage was presently directed against Zela's Arabs, 
who made their appearance from the bushes, whither they 
had been lured by the cubs of a leopard, one of which 
they had secured, De Kuyter having shot the dam. I 
was infuriated at these fellows for having put Zela's life 
in jeopardy, and gave chase to one, with the determination 
of shooting him. My pistol was pointed at his breast, 
and I was in the act of pulling the trigger, when a hand 
struck up my arm, and the pistol was discharged in the 
air. I turned round, prepared to fell the intruder with 
the heavy-capped butt-end of the weapon, when the eye 
of Zela met mine with a glance that penetrated my breast, 
and would have restored my reason, had I been mad. In 
her low piercing accents, she said — 

" He is our foster-brother ; our milk was the same, so 
must be our blood. Let us not destroy each other. Has 
not the Prophet, this day, saved the remnant of our father's 
a a 4 



S60 ADVENTURES OP 

house? It is the evil spirit, which pursued my lather to 
his death, that hath now descended on you ! His hand is 
on your heart ; beware lest it should be turned to stone. 
His shadow is hanging over you, like a cloud over the 
sun, and makes you appear as black, and fierce, and un- 
forgiving as himself!" 

(C You are our Malay's hawk, I suppose ; but the black 
shadow of the raven's wing is vanished — the sun is un- 
obscured — the ill-omened bird has left me ! I must to 
the jungle again. What can have become of De Ruyter ? 
Come, mount your elephant : I would rather entrust you 
to him, than leave you girt round by a thousand Arabs. 
He is a noble beast." 

Going up to him, I gave Zela some bread and fruit that 
she might feed him. He seemed abstracted in gloomy 
contemplation, and gazed with more than human sympathy 
on the prostrate body of the dying mahout. He noticed 
us not ; and as his eye fell on the dead tiger, he stamped, 
looked fierce, and made a trumpeting noise, as if in triumph 
at having avenged his friend's death ! Then, as if re- 
membering he had avenged, but not saved, his ears and 
trunk drooped ; and though he himself was torn and bleed- 
ing, his moist and thoughtful eye gave token that all his 
feelings were absorbed in grief for him he had lost. He 
stood over and watched the Arabs, who were making a sort 
of hurdle for the purpose of carrying away the dying man ; 
for his breast was torn open, and one of his groins dread- 
fully mangled. The affectionate beast refused to eat, even 
after the man was conveyed out of sight. I placed the 
bamboo ladder against him, and Zela mounted to the 
houdah : he curled his trunk round ; and on recognising 
who it was, resumed his former position, and continued to 
make low moans, as of anguish. 

I must remark that the man for whom the elephant was 
mourning had long been his provider; and, since the 
death of the mahout who was killed by the chieftain, had 
himself become mahout. The elephant did not seem at 
all concerned at the death of the Tiroon, doubtless owing 
to his having been a bad and cruel master ; for certainly 
these animals not only have reason, but are more rational 



A YOUNGER SON. 36 1 

than those they serve. In gratitude for his having saved 
Zela's and my life, I would, had it been possible, have 
kept, loved, and cherished him. When we parted from 
him, Zela kissed him, wept, and cut off some of the strong 
bristly hair near his ears, which I have ever worn, hooped 
round a ring, engraven with his name. 

But again I am wandering from my subject ; nor can I 
restrain myself. I must dwell on those occurrences, how- 
ever trifling to others, which were written on my memory 
thus early. Now my brain is like a confused scrawl, 
crossed and recrossed, blotted, soiled, and torn : it can 
contain no more, and that which was written in after 
years is illegible; so that when I come to narrate the 
latter events of my life, it will be as difficult, and require 
as much time, toil, and patience, as the unrolling of the 
antique parchments of Herculaneum, or the Egyptian 
papyri, and, like them, when deciphered, not worth the 
trouble. 



CHAPTER IX. 



Most wretched men ; 
And cradled into poetry by wrong* 
They learn in suffering what they teach in song. 

And now his limbs were lean ; his scattered hair, 

Sered by the autumn of strange suffering, 

Sung dirges in the wind ; his listless hand 

Hung like dead bone within its withered skin ; 

Life, and the lustre that consumed it, shone 

As in a furnace burning secretly 

From his dark eyes alone. Shelley. 

Collecting a party of men, I returned to the jungle in 
search of De Ruyter, whose long absence alarmed me. At 
last I heard his well-known voice, hallooing, and calling by 
name one of his followers. On coming up to him, he in- 
quired anxiously after a Frenchman, his secretary, who had 
accompanied him to the jungle, and was missing. The 
wild animals being now driven to the plain, we separated 



36% ADVENTURES OF 

into parties of twos and threes, and explored, in different 
directions, a wide extent of the thicket, calling out his 
name, and firing musquets to let him know where we were. 
But in vain ; and the rapid approach of night warning us 
to leave the gloomy abode of tigers, reptiles, and fever, we 
walked towards our tents, marvelling what could have 
become of the Frenchman. 

He was a young man whom De Ruyter, in compassion 
for some misfortunes which had happened to him at the 
Isle of France, had befriended; and, to dissipate his 
melancholy, had taken him from the counting-house of 
De Ruyter's agents, where he was employed, to make this 
voyage, during which he was to act as supercargo. At 
the first he fulfilled his duty with exactness; but was 
hardly ever out of his own cabin in the day time, and 
never mingled nor communicated with those on board, De 
Ruyter excepted. He ate little. Books and writing, which 
had been, as a poet, his only solace, lost their power to 
move him. He continued for days gloomily entranced 
in abstracted reveries, only broken by talking, at times, to 
himself, and monotonously sounding a broken guitar. In 
my visits to the grab I rarely saw him ; and, being piqued 
at his distant manner, I was fool enough to resent it, not 
discriminating that he was tongue-tied from sorrow, not 
from haughtiness. One day he was seated on the tafFrail, 
his favourite seat, and, on my asking him a question, his 
mind was so abstracted that he did not hear me. Nettled 
at this, I made some sarcastic comparison, — I forget what. 
He appeared stung by it; but remained silent, and walked 
down to his cabin. Van Scolpvelt, who heard this, told me 
I was very much in the wrong. (C For/' said he," he is a 
hypochondriac ; and if he follow not my advice, will as- 
suredly go mad. As he consumes more opium than a 
Chinese, he may be considered a dreaming philosopher. 
In the hallucinations, produced by that drug, his faculties 
are entranced. He is smitten on the brain, — he reads and 
writes verses ! I caught him in the act ! Fools might say 
he was inspired; but I know it is the first and worst 
symptom of lunacy. All other maniacs have lucid inter- 
vals ; some are cureable ; but the madness of poets, dogs, 



A YOUNGER SON. S68 

and musicians, is past hope. Earth possesses no remedy., 
science no cure/' 

That night I lay on deck waiting De Ruyfcer, who was 
on shore. Every one, I believed, was asleep but myself. 
I saw the young Frenchman come up the hatchway ; 
the bright light of the moon fell on his face, and made 
him look more pallid than that luminary. He walked 
steadily two or three times around the deck, as if seeking 
some person. I thought on Torro ; and that, as I had 
insulted him, he might meditate revenge. Nevertheless I 
lay still, with just enough of my eyes shut, as he passed, 
to make him believe I slept. He regarded me, for a 
moment, steadfastly. If he had held any weapon, I 
should have sprung up ; but his eye looked dull and heavy, 
and his hands hung listlessly down. He went aft, moved 
one of the shot- cases, as if going to sit down, and mounted 
to his usual place, the taffrail. I still kept my eyes fixed 
on him, and saw his fixed on the moon. He turned to 
gaze on the water, muttering something which I could not 
distinguish, when, as if he had lost his balance, he fell 
into the sea. I sprung up, awakened the sleepers nearest 
to me, hastened to the spot whence he had fallen, and called 
out, ee A man overboard ! — Drop the boat astern ! *' 

The schooner lay in the grab's wake, and the night was 
so still that they heard my orders ; and I heard them getting 
into their boat, as I shoved off in ours. I kept steadfastly 
looking at the spot where the man had sunk, around which 
the water rippled and sparkled ; and after a painful sus- 
pense I observed the body (for the sea was transparent as 
glass for many fathoms), as if suspended midway. It was 
bent double, with the face downward ; the bright globular 
buttons on the back of the jacket, such as are worn by 
dragoons, shone clearly. Forgetting every thing but the 
man's danger, and knowing this was a critical moment, I 
plunged in head foremost, so as to bring myself close to 
him under water. I caught hold of his arm ; and the im- 
petus with which a good swimmer brings himself up 
brought us both to the surface. I then endeavoured, by 
shifting my gripe, to lift his head from the water ; but his 
body was rigidly bent, and so extraordinarily heavy, thatj 



364 



ADVENTURES OF 



notwithstanding the violent exertions I made to keep myself 
afloat, and the unruffled surface of the sea in my favour, I 
swallowed so much water that I was half water-logged 
myself. About to let him go, in order to preserve 
myself, the schooner's boat reached me an oar; missing 
that, she passed over us, and forced me under water. How- 
ever, in imminent peril of drowning, I retained hold of 
the body. Two men from the boat plunged in, when the 
young Frenchman, to our surprise, became almost buoyant. 
We were then all hauled into the boat, and returned to the 
grab with our rescued man, who showed no signs of life. 

Sick, cramped, with a head as if bursting, I was accosted 
by Van, who felt my pulse, and said, f< You are in need of 
medicine; and sea- water is very good for a strong stomach. 
But you were injudicious in exhibiting so large a dose. 
I never prescribe more than a tumbler full, to be taken 
fasting every day, a.m." 

"Go, doctor, and look at your patient below. If I 
have gulped a barrel, you '11 find he has swallowed a butt, 
and must bulge, if you don 't bear a hand and bale him 
out." 

" How long was he in the water ? " 

<e I can't say ; — it seemed to me an hour." 

cc No," said the Rais ; " I turned the minute glass six 
times." 

" Oh ! " replied Van, <e you need not then have been 
so impatient. You may safely remain under water for 
twenty minutes, provided I am at hand to restore you. 
Come, — you shall see." 

Down he stalked into the cabin, where he caused the 
body to be stripped and laid on a table. Then by means 
of external warmth, friction, and an artificial inflation of 
the lungs, faint symptoms of returning life appeared. 
Louis, who stood by with his stone bottle, now placed it 
to the man's mouth, and was about to drench him, but Van 
indignantly pushed it away. Nevertheless Louis pertinaci- 
ously insisted on it ever after that he, not the doctor, had saved 
the man's life, by allowing him to inhale the aroma of the 
skedam. A small bottle of ether was placed to the man's 
nose, and afterwards a few drops, diluted, were poured 



A YOUNGER SOX, 365 

down his throat ; but it was some hours before he opened 
his eyes, or moved his limbs. 

But to shorten my story, he recovered ; and we ascer- 
tained that his design had been to drown himself; that he 
had taken two double-headed cannon shot from the case 
which lay aft, ready for service, and, with one in each 
hand, by way of ballast, had dropped himself overboard , 
having previously assured himself that we were ail asleep. 
From this time forth he sank into the gloomiest despair, 
totally indifferent to every thing. He neither spoke, nor 
ate, unless at De Ruyter's entreaty, and then merely to be 
rid of his importunity. His aversion to me (since 1 had 
saved his life) appeared to be the only feeling left him, 
He scowled at me, as in abhorrence, when accident, which 
seldom occurred, brought us near each other. 

It was about a month after this event that we set out 
for the tiger hunt, when he applied for permission to 
accompany us, which De Ruyter gladly gave him. He 
had followed in the rear of our party, and seemed to dread 
being noticed. It was strictly enjoined by De Ruyter, 
who himself never lost sight of him, that he should in no 
way be molested, or intruded on. When we arrived at the 
hunting-ground, he was more observant and wakeful; I 
thought he even looked cheerful. On entering the jungle, 
there was a strange brightness in his eyes, a quickness hi 
his movements. Instead of his wonted scowl, or shudder, 
and averted look, as I passed him, he appeared as if going 
to address me, and smiled, with kindness beaming in his 
aspect. He stood by De Ruyter, when he and I backed 
into the first tiger's lair; and, though armed with a car- 
bine, he did not attempt to use it. This carbine was 
afterwards found near the place. During the confusion 
which ensued he must have withdrawn himself, as from 
that moment he could not be traced, nor was he ever after 
heard of. 

ic 1 have reason to believe," said De Ruyter to me, 
" from some expressions that dropped from him, that, 
having pledged his word not to offer violence to himself 
again, while we were seeking tigers to destroy, he sought 
them to be destroyed. When urging him against self- 



S66 



ADVENTURES OP 



destruction, after you had rescued him, he answered me 
querulously, and half abstractedly, " Am I a doomed slave, 
that I cannot dispose of my own body, now that it is a 
burthen? Why should that fierce Englishman, who 
destroys every thing opposing him, and delights in cutting 
off those who cling to life, drag me from my quiet rest 
under the sea? The coral rocks seemed soft as her 
bosom ! I thought I was sleeping on her lap in heaven ! 
Then that devil brought me back to this hell here, — to 
me a tenfold one ! There is no quiet but in death ; and 
they have all conspired to keep me, that loathe life, living. 
But I will defeat their malice, — yet keep my promise V 

For three days we continued our hunting in the jungle, 
and amidst the ruins, more excited by the hope of ascer- 
taining the fate of the young Frenchman, than by the 
sport. Indeed the greater portion of the tigers had aban- 
doned this part of the wood ; and the accidents which had 
occurred had sobered our enthusiasm. The mysterious 
disappearance of a person we are interested in impels us 
strangely on to undergo any toil, or sacrifice, which we 
fancy may clear it up ; but our search was fruitless. Ex- 
cept the carbine, we could neither discover the youth, nor 
any rag nor thing that had been his. 

There was, indeed, afterwards, the strongest positive 
evidence, if men's oaths are to be believed (which I, for 
one, discredit), that the suicide- spirit haunted the grab. 
His complaints were heard muttering in the wind ; his 
shadowy form rested on the taffrail; and, if any one was 
hardy enough to approach, it plunged into the sea, and 
followed in the ship's wake, struggling in vain to sink under 
the surface. The sailors moreover asserted, on their oaths, 
that he was no living man when he was first entered on 
board, that the captain should never have placed him on 
the ship's books, and that he would pursue them till his 
body was buried. De Ruyter told me he could not yet get 
the fellows aft to the main boom at night, and had several 
times nearly lost it, and had his vessel endangered by their 
superstition. 



A YOUNGER SON. 3Qj 



CHAPTER X. 

Alas ! what drove him mad ? 
* * * * I cannot say. 
A lady came with him from France, and when 
She left him, * * he wandered then 
About yon lonelv isles of desert sand, 
Till he grew wild. Shelley. 

Love, jealous grown of so complete a pair, 

Hover'd and buzz'd his wings, with fearful roar, 

Above the lintel of their chamber door, 

And down the passage cast a glow upon the floor. Keats. 

The history of this youth I learnt from De Ruyter. His 
agent in the Isle of France had written to Europe for 
French clerks; and some time after, two young persons 
landed with a recommendation to him. They called them- 
selves brothers, which was warranted by a strong family re- 
semblance. The elder was seemingly under twenty, and 
the other much younger; both handsome, gentle, and 
strikingly elegant, but the younger more particularly so, 
being likewise delicate and effeminate in appearance and 
manner. An apartment was assigned to them in the mer- 
chant's house. The elder knew very little of business 
when he came out, the younger less ; their employer was 
vexed at this, but their unremitting attention and fidelity 
soon reconciled him to them, till, by application, they be- 
came admirable accountants. They were inseparable, 
shunning all intercourse with others, and were utterly dif- 
ferent from the young men he had ever seen. For this 
conduct they gave plausible reasons ; the delicate health of 
the younger, their being orphans, and the injunction of 
their dying parents. 

A malignant fever, then rife in the country ^ seized on 
the younger, and the other never quitted him. For change 
of air they were removed out of the merchant's house, in 
Port St. Louis, to a villa. Not having seen or heard of 
them for some days, the merchant walked out one evening 
to visit them. On approaching the villa, he was alarmed 
at observing, though it was then the hottest time of the 
year, and the coolest of the day, the place shut up, silent, 



368 



ADVENTURES OP 



and apparently abandoned. After calling and knocking 
many times, he forced open a back window, and entered 
the house. Hearing a low moaning noise in a room over 
his head, he went up stairs, listened at the door, called the 
brothers by name, received no answer, tried the door, and 
found it was secured. He procured instruments, and broke 
it open. The brothers lay on a mattress on the floor, 
locked fast in each other's embraces. He thought them 
both dead ; yet having so recently heard the voice of one, 
he examined them more closely ; and uncovering the bodies 
for that purpose, he was amazed at discovering the younger 
to be a woman. She had been dead some time. The 
lover, who was a strong, athletic youth, just on the verge 
of complete manhood, exhibited faint signs of life. 

Examining the room, the merchant found a sealed paper 
addressed to him, the contents of which deeply affected 
him, and solved the mystery. It there appeared that the 
youth, unable to endure the loss of his beloved, and his 
disease not destroying him as speedily as he desired (for 
he too had caught the fever), had swallowed poison — 
opium, — that, as in life, so in death, their spirits might be 
inseparable. The merchant, gifted with presence of mind 
and knowledge, eventually restored the youth to life ; the 
violence of passion neutralising, or, at least, diminishing the 
effect of the opium. Still the poison, or grief, the most 
subtle of destroyers, had penetrated the brain, and he was 
for some months, in a state of mental oblivion. Time and 
care restored his faculties ; but the body and mind refused 
their mutual succour, and warred against each other. While 
the mind lay torpid, the body gained strength ; but, on re- 
suming its faculties, it preyed on the body. Sunk into 
misery and despondency, he was a mere shadow, and 
wandered, during the darkness, like a phantom. The man 
of bales and ships' bottoms fortunately retained touches 
of humanity, and did all he could to obliterate or mitigate 
such sorrow. But it lay too deep for the surgeon's probe, 
the leech's drug, or a friend's sympathy. As a last hope, 
De Ruyter embarked him on board the grab, thinking, if 
anything could stir him, it would be our bustling and ever- 
varying life. 



A YOUNGER SOU. 360 

The letter left by the youth, previously to his taking the 
opium, explained every thing. They were of a noble 
family. The young lady had been educated in a convent 
in Paris, founded for the incarceration of the younger 
daughters of those proud, unnatural, aristocratic parents, 
who, to defeat the wise and just ordination of the law of 
France, by which property is equally apportioned, consign 
their last offspring to living graves, that they may be 
robbed of their birthright. The youth gained admittance 
there, privileged by ties of consanguinity. Their love was 
known, for it had grown from youth, though circumstances 
had separated them. They saw each other, after the lapse 
of years, when the innocent love of childhood burst into a 
fierce and uncontrollable passion. Possibly the vestal sisters 
dreamed not of love's finding an entrance into their holy 
asylum, much less of what that love might lead to. Be- 
sides, love was forbidden there. 

" The walls are high ; the gates are strong; thick set 
The sentinels ; but true love never yet 
Was thus constrained." 

Escape was contrived in disguise, and executed. They 
reached Havre de Grace. A Dutch skipper, bribed with 
all their wealth, concealed them in his ship. The Argus- 
eyed police of Prance was in motion. They were traced ; 
an embargo was laid on the port and every vessel searched, 
from her truck to her kelston. The skipper knew the con- 
sequences of detection, the least of which was restitution of 
the gold and jewels he had received ; while the dread of 
fine and imprisonment sharpened his wit, and inspired him 
with cunning, surpassing that of the police. Whilst the 
embargo continued, and during the heat of the scrutiny on 
board the ships in the port, he concealed the lovers, whom 
he believed to be the sons of a conscript of rank, in the 
vaults of his own smuggling agent. On the vessel being 
allowed to leave the port, he re- shipped them, and most 
providentially headed them for security in two casks, 
stowed on deck ; for (whether from any suspicion of this 
particular vessel, or that it was a general practice, is not 
mentioned) when the Dutchman had got his vessel under 
weigh, he was boarded by the police agents, and the search 

B B 



3?0 ADVENTURES OF 

renewed,, with augmented rigour. It was then that a police 
officer took the hung out of the cask, in which the girl was 
concealed, and passed his sword in it, grazing her hosom ; 
while the skipper carelessly observed, " It's only an empty 
water cask !" Love, which gives to the gentlest heart the 
courage of a hero, enabled her to endure this desperate 
ordeal in silence. 

Thus they eluded the searchers, and escaped to Holland, 
friendless and destitute. The skipper, fearing discovery, 
and judging from circumstances which had transpired, 
during the search of the police, that this was not a common 
case, and that he had risked more than he had bargained 
for, became extremely uneasy on the subject, anxiously 
seeking to remove every trace that could implicate him. 
He knew he had been deceived, but could by no threats or 
wiles draw from them who or what they really were. At 
that time the Dutch were employing every m.eans to induce 
adventurers to go out to their Indian settlements ; and our 
smuggling skipper was one of their agents. The youth 
proposed that he should procure them situations in one of 
those settlements, to which he instantly listened, and 
wondered he had never thought of proposing it himself. 
To his great joy they were shipped for the Isle of France, 
recommended to the merchant's house already mentioned ; 
and the skipper, in addition to what he had previously 
pocketed, realised a handsome premium for procuring two 
promising and well-educated volunteers. He knew he had 
little to fear from their being heard of again. 

I have been thus minute in setting down this French- 
man's history, as it was the first instance which I had met 
with, or which had been related to me in an authenticated 
shape, of one of that nation loving anything in the world 
bo dearly as himself. 



A YOUNGER SON. 3?1 



CHAPTER XL 

Who would suppose, from Adam's simple ration, 

That cookery could have called forth such resources, 

As form a science and a nomenclature 

From out the commonest demands of nature ? 

Thera was a goodly soup. Byron. 

This excursion having detained us much longer than we 
had intended, we returned with all possible haste to the 
place whence we had started, and embarked, having the 
satisfaction to find all right on board our vessels, and the 
schooner nearly ready for sea. 

I had brought De Ruyter intelligence, among other news 
from his agents at Pulo Penang, of an expedition fitting 
out by the English, destined to attack the pirates at Sambos 
on this island. The marauders were very numerous there, 
and had committed great havoc on the Company's private 
trade, both by sea and land; for, like the Court of 
Chancery, they endeavoured to get all property into their 
keeping. It was determined to attempt the annihilation 
of — not the Court of Chancery, but — the comparatively 
harmless pirates, during the season they were congregated 
together, weather-bound in their port of Sambos. De 
Ruyter resolved to defeat the expedition; and, but for the 
crippled state of the schooner, I was to be immediately de- 
spatched in search of French cruizers, to give them in- 
telligence, and combine measures for an attack on the 
Company's force by sea. That not having been possible, 
De Ruyter laid his plans to aid the natives on shore, to 
whom he pledged his assistance. 

At length I took in my wood and water on board the 
schooner, and sailed for Java, with letters and instructions 
from De Ruyter* On the same day he took his departure 
for Sambos. I lent him a party of my men, and two brass 
guns. Thus we again separated. My commission was to 
deliver despatches to the governor of Batavia, to purchase 
stores and provisions, and to meet the grab again, without 
& & 2 



372 ADVENTURES OP 

loss of time, at our appointed rendezvous. Louis went 
with me as negotiator for the victualling department. 

Nothing particular occurred during my run to Java ex- 
cept the capture, or rather recapture (for she had been 
previously taken by an English man-of-war) of a small 
Spanish vessel, belonging to merchants at the Philippine 
Islands, loaded with camphor, and the celebrated edible 
birds' nests. There were only six English sailors and a 
midshipman in charge of her, although so valuable a prize ; 
consequently she could attempt no resistance. 

A short time before this, an English man-of-war brig 
had captured, off the Philippine Islands, a Spanish vessel, 
containing a cargo of this sea-slug. On the English 
officer's boarding her, and asking what she was loaded 
with, the Spaniards truly answered, " Birds' nests." John 
Bull, whose ship had recently entered the Chinese seas, 
with gaping wonder exclaimed, " Birds' nests ! What, 
you rascals, do you take me for a spoony greenhorn ? 
Birds' nests ! I'll birds'-nest you, you lubberly liars ! Off 
with the hatchways !" 

Accordingly the hold of the vessel was searched, and the 
English sailors were dumbfounded at discovering nothing 
but sacks of stinking, dirty, muddy-looking swallows' nests, 
such as they had seen sticking under the eaves of houses. 
They still thought this slimy compost was merely placed 
as a skreen or cover, to shelter something more valuable, 
and threw a great portion of it overboard, in order to arrive 
at the treasure below — chuckling, and treating the Spa- 
niards with derision, the Jack-tars cutting many witticisms 
on Spanish sailors going a birds'-nesting. They cleared 
down to her kelston, and searched into every nook in vain. 
Their officer, on his return to the brig, gave the commander 
an account of what the Spaniards had told him, and that 
he had verified it with his own eyes ; upon which there 
was a general laugh throughout the ship. " However," 
quoth the greenhorn commander, " the vessel is Spanish, 
and we must keep her. Though she is but in ballast, her 
hull is worth something. They must have been hard up 
for shingle, where they come from, to put sludge in her, — 
and in bags !" 



A YOUNGER SON. 3?S 

He then gave orders that a midshipman, and three or 
four of his worst men, should take charge of her, and run 
her into the nearest port. One rational thing he did was 
to remove the Spanish prisoners to his own brig, or they 
would have soon retaken her. Thus he left her, and it 
was not till he himself put into a Chinese port, and acci- 
dentally mentioned this occurrence, as a joke against the 
Spaniards, that he learnt the value of the prize. The 
edible birds' nests were at that time selling in the Chinese 
market at thirty-two Spanish dollars a kattie; so that, 
on a computation of the quantity in the vessel, she was 
worth from eighty to ninety thousand pounds ; and he, 
poor devil, that had served twenty years without clearing 
twenty pounds prize-money, would have made a fortune. He 
raged, and stormed, and went to sea again to look after her. 
He offered up prayers, for the first time in his life, for her 
safe arrival in port. But it was otherwise decreed ; the 
few lubberly fellows he had put on board of her were not 
sufficient to work her, and she was wrecked on the coast 
of China. A galleon of gold-dust would not have been 
such a windfall to the Chinese as was this cargo of sea- 
slug. The news spread like wildfire through the country 
that a vessel had stranded on their coast containing incal- 
culable wealth. The timid Chinese forgot their fears, 
and, regardless of winds and seas, rushed through the 
foaming surf, trampled the strong over the weak, brother 
over brother, all hurrying on board the wreck ; which was 
so effectually pillaged, that she was left floating like an 
empty tea-chest, not a grain of her cargo being left sticking 
to her ribs. During the scramble in the water, and on 
the wreck — for every handful was fought for — many 
lives were lost; and the coast, for several miles round, 
was in anarchy and confusion for a long time after. 

The capturer of the prize I Tetook was of the class 
of well-informed officers. I had more care of her ; and, 
for security, took my prize in tow. Louis entreated that 
he might go on board of her as prize-agent ; declaring 
that the only thing he wished was to perfect himself in 
the mystery of concocting that savoury and glutinous 
soup, secundum artem, so famous in China, that they have 
b b 3 



374? ADVENTURES OF 

a proverb there, which says that if the spirit of life were 
departing from the nostrils, and the odour of this soup 
were to salute them, the spirit would reanimate the clay, 
knowing there is no luxury in paradise to compare with it. 
" Besides," added Louis, " should I introduce this de- 
licious restorative into Europe, and the no less renowned 
Chinese arrack-punch, I shall be more deservedly famous 
than Van Tromp, or the Prince of Orange, — and I will 
be ! " 

With these ambitious and glorious aspirations, Louis le 
Grand, in conjunction with a Chinese cook, went to work, 
heart and hand ; and in the middle of a dark night, off a 
a lee shore, he hailed me to heave-to, and send a boat, that 
he might bring me a sample of his triumphant success. 
He came with it ; and, though not at that time, I have 
tasted this dish. It is certainly a voluptuous relish, but 
too glutinously rich for any stomach like mine, accustomed 
to simple fare. In addition to the slimy composition of 
the nest, which, when dissolved, is like brown jelly, or 
melted glue, there were the sinews of deer, the feet of 
pigs, the fins of young sharks, the brawny part of a pig's 
head, with plovers' eggs, mace, cinnamon, and red peppers. 
Turtle soup is tasteless after it ; and it is a marvel that 
the numerous gastronomic votaries of Europe have not 
made this superlative offering to their palates. They are 
to blame. 



CHAPTER XII. 

But I am Pestilence ; hither and thither 

I flit about that I may slay and smother : 

All lips that I have kiss'd must surely wither, 

But Death's, — if thou art he, we '11 go to work together. Shelley 

Where youth grows pale, and spectre-thin, and dies, 

Where but to think is to be full of sorrow 
And leaden-eyed despair, 
Where beauty cannot keep her lustrous eyes, 

Or new love pine at them beyond to-morrrow. Keats. 

I touched at one of the Barlie Islands, which lay in my 
course, but could get little else there but a couple of sacks 



A YOUNGER SON. S?5 

of Chinese tobacco, which is excellent. While haggling 
about the price, I was playing with a pretty, slim, Malay 
child. <c Come/' said the mother, fi give me the gold 
more, and you shall have the tobacco, the four fowls, the 
basket of eggs, the fruit, and my eldest-born child into the 
bargain, — as you seem to like her." 

I threw down the gold coin, told the men to take the 
things into the boat, and led away the girl, about eight years 
old, giving her some fruit to eat, and pice to play with, 
while neither she nor the affectionate parent exchanged a 
look of sorrow at parting. The little thing accompanied 
me on board, perfectly enchanted with her new abode. I 
gave her to Zela ; and in my own mind lauded the mother, 
who exhibited so strong a proof of not being influenced by 
those narrow and illiberal prejudices which prevail in 
Europe. All nature teaches us that when the offspring are 
weaned, and can walk, they ought no longer to be an in- 
cumbrance : dogs abandon their puppies, the cow her calf, 
the ewe her lamb; and Christian mothers who are enlight- 
ened abandon their cubs, doubtless prompted by their 
superior natural instinct. Truly the Malay mother went a 
step beyond them in making a profit of her produce. In 
justice to European parents, I must say, at least I believe, 
they have good sense enough, and certainly know the value 
of gold well enough, not to throw away that which, had 
they known of an Eastern market, could have been turned 
to profit. But in this, like the English commander with 
the birds' nests, they are greenhorns. 

France and Holland were then united under the same 
dictatorship. Arrived at Batavia, the capital of Java, I 
was well received by the governor, a Dutch officer. Having 
delivered my despatches, he ordered the authorities under 
him to afford me every facility in refitting and provisioning 
my vessel; and advised me to lose no time in the port, and 
to communicate as little as possible with the shore, on ac- 
count of the cholera-morbus, which was then prevailing. 
The merchants of the Dutch factory were so officiously 
hospitable and kind, that they bored me to death with offers 
of houses, and invitations to feasting and gormandizing. 
De Ruyter was their hero ; and the evident unlimited con- 
b b 4 



376* ADVENTURES OP 

fldence he reposed in me, the large sums I was commis- 
sioned to negotiate, and the power I possessed of expending 
what sum or sums I pleased, had a magical effect. Besides, 
I had established a private stock of fame, and a name 
which served my purpose very well, and passsd current for 
what I then wanted ; though detraction has since analysed 
— not it, but what malignity asserts it was, — and declared 
the coin was base, and that the stamper of the die deserved 
a halter,— assertions proceeding from sheer envy and malice. 
As for gold, I had not then acquired those artificial wants 
which it can supply. 

" Out simple life wants little, and true taste 
Hires not the pale drudge, luxury, to waste 
The scene it would adorn." 

Neither was I born with gentlemanly appetites, but, as 
Louis said, lived more like a " nigur" than a Christian. 
Like Michael Cassio, I had unhappy brains for drinking ; 
my nature was too inflammable tamely to bear the spur 
of wine in excess. Feasting and swilling, amidst the 
sweltering and unclean slaves of the mouth, I ever held in 
Brahminical abhorrence. I therefore shunned the hospi- 
table board of the merchants, expediting my business with 
them, impatient to regain my own little cabin, which, con- 
taining Zela, was spacious enough for all the treasure I 
possessed or coveted. We were greedy and insatiable in 
our love, and required little else. We feasted on the same 
bunch of grapes, a shadock, or a sun-cleft pomegranate. 
We drank from the same cup, and sat on the same mat. 
Excess of love was my only excess ; and, either from love 
or temperance in diet, I acquired strength and hardiness, 
proof against sickness, resisting all contagion. Whilst 
others writhed and suffered from scratches, the deepest 
wounds healed with me, unaided by the surgeon ; and the 
cholera-morbus, now raging and destroying with a viru- 
lence only to be equalled by the plague, could not penetrate 
my strong and healthful frame. 

The Europeans, both on board and on shore, declared 
that the sole effectual preservative was, what they called, 
living well and drinking freely ; that the fever was like a 
blustering bully ; — 



A YOUNGER SON. 377 

" He was a coward to the strong, 
He was a tyrant to the weak." 

I acquiesced in this doctrine, but differed in the premises. 
They averred that the stimulant of fiery drink was the 
method of keeping up the languid circulation, the quantity 
not specified. Water, fruit, rice, vegetables, and all crude 
substances, were interdicted as the worst of poisons. Yet 
I pursued this diet, and so did my native crew, and we 
lived; while the Europeans followed their system, and died 
like murrained sheep. Vessels in the harbour were driven 
on shore, for want of hands to secure them ; others, 
freighted, could not muster strength to weigh their anchors. 
A French and a Dutch ship of war, under sailing orders, 
were in such a state that they could not leave the port, 
much less work their ships at sea. Tf the disease could 
have been fended off by free living, the European portion 
of my crew would have been fever-proof. Yet it not only 
boarded us, but had the audacity to fall foul, exclusively, 
on the hardy sons of the north, while it respected its own 
progeny, the children of the sun. 



CHAPTER XIII. 

A mist arose, as from a scummy marsh : 

At this, through all his bulk, an agony 

Crept gradual, from the feet unto the crown, 

Like a lithe serpent vast and muscular 

Making slow way, with head and neck convulsed 

From over-strained might. Keats. 

As if to decide the question of diet, the contagion by one 
fell blow, by one signal example, aimed his shaft at the 
head and prime organ of his vaunting defiers, and struck 
Louis. If eating and drinking could have warded off 
disease, he might have been immortal. He gormandized 
like a vulture, and on such dainty and nutritive bits, that 
a whale's liver would not have produced more oil or an 



378 ADVENTURES OF 

ox's ribs more tallow than Louis le Grand. As to drink, 
his throat and stomach must have been lined with some- 
thing as fire-proof as asbestos, or they could not have resisted 
the burning liquid which he had for so many years insa- 
tiably poured down, enough to wear out a dozen copper 
funnels. From the time the fatal malady commenced its 
havoc on board the schooner, every hour the ship's glass 
was turned, and the bell was struck, Louis marked the 
time by calling out, a Boy ! don't you know the glass is 
turned, and the fever come on board ? Bring the stone 
bottle to keep him out ! " upon which he turned a glass 
down his coppers. Arnold's chronometer in the cabin kept 
not better time than Louis with his bottle. So unerring 
was his palate, that if, by error or neglect, the bell was not 
struck punctually, he never failed to cal] out, " Boy, the 
bottle !" when, if the urchin pleaded that the bell had not 
struck, Louis vociferated, " Then it should have done so; 
— 'tis more than a minute past the hour ; tumble up, you 
idle sea-calf, — give me the bottle ! " At last he exclaimed, 
ic Ha ! you young scorpion, what have you been at ? — 
sucking the bottle, and then bulling it with bilge-water ? 
Why, this is not out of my locker ; this is beastly stuff, — 
would make a sea-horse sick." 

The boy asserted it was the same he had always drunk 
when Louis waxed wroth, dashed the liquor in his face, 
and was about to rope's-end him. " Hold !" said I, u let 
me smell it, Louis. Come, I'll swear it's all right." 

" What \ " he replied, " don't I know my own skedam ? 
— the devil himself could never deceive me in that, since 
I was five years old ! Van Siilpke, the great spirit-mer- 
chant of A.msterdam, declared I could ascertain, better than 
his spirit-proof, the strength and quality of his liquors ; 
and, besides, I've swallowed as much as would float the 
schooner, — haven't I ?" Here Louis paused, and showed 
evident signs of sickness. 

" Damned devil-boy!" he went on; (< he has been 
sucking the bottle, and filled it up with physic, — and I 
can't abide doctor's stuff! Bring another bottle, devil, 
thief, liar!" 

Another bottle was brought, and he tasted it ; but the 



A YOUNGER SON. 87 Q 

hitherto genial fluid had lost its flavour on his palate. He 
spat, and sputtered,, and pushed the bottle from him. I 
observed also that he removed a fresh-lighted pipe from his 
mouth ; and, thinking there must be really something the 
matter with him, I got up and went over to him. The 
glow-worm sparkle of his small eager eye was dimmed, his 
lips were white and frothy, the lower jaw hung down, his 
head was drooping, and his hands were clenched. " Holloa, 
old Louis, what's the matter ? Are you ill ? " 

"111! — no, I'm never ill, — I'm only sickish. That 
damned stuff is like poison in me ! " As he said this he 
made a strong effort to rouse himself. 

" Come," I replied, " you are ill. Go out of the sun, 
and lie down aft." 

" No, captain, I'm not such a fool as to be ill. I was 
never sick like this except once, in the South Seas, at the 
Island of Otaheite, when those — what do you call them ? 
- — missionaries came aboard to preachify with the crew, 
and cheat them of their dollars. Like a great fool, I went 
ashore with them, and they gave me some cursed stuff they 
called gin, — such blasphemy I never heard ! At first 
when they told me they had set up a great distillery of gin, 
I thought them very useful, clever, good. men; for yen 
know, captain, any nation might be converted by hollands; 
— but this was the unchristianest, beastliest liquor I ever 
tasted, and it made me — as I feel now. Yet the foolish, 
idiot-people of the island think it very good, because it 
makes them mad-drunk, and they believe Heaven sent it ; 
but it made me believe the devil had got amongst them." 

Louis broke off his story by complaining of pains all over 
his body, his head, and stomach. I loved Louis, and saw 
with grief the ravage which the envenomed and ghastly 
destroyer was tracing on his broad and honest face. I led 
him down to my own cabin, placed him on my couch, and 
charged the gentle Zela (who Louis declared was too kind 
and good to be a woman) to nurse him, and, if aught 
human could, to avert the evil power, whose armed hand I 
beheld striking at his life. But it was written ; and the 
stern decrees of fate who can turn aside ? He struggled 
convulsively, and foamed, and raved> and then sank into 



880 ADVENTURES OP 

idiotic insensibility, moaning and muttering incoherent 
words. As the day dawned (from long habit, outliving 
both strength of body and mind), he said, in faint but clear 
accents, the first intelligible sentence he had spoken for 
many hours, "Boy! bring the bottle!" The weaned 
and dozing boy raised himself from the cabin deck, on 
which he had sunk, overworn with watching, staggered 
across the cabin to perform his first diurnal duty for years, 
and groped at the accustomed locker for the stone bottle. I 
asked Louis how he was. " Hot ! very hot, and thirsty ! 
— my body is burning hot, parched up_, dry as ashes, not 
a drop of moisture. Why, I am in an oven ! — Boy, the 
bottle!" 

I could not resist the supplicating look of his eye, and 
the trembling eagerness of his hand as he grasped at the 
glass, which the boy, now thoroughly awakened, held out; 
but the instant the spirit, which he used to declare was the 
spirit of life, had touched his white and clammy lips, he 
shrank from it, and dashed it from him as if it had been a 
scorpion. Then, looking wild with horror around, he cried 
out, " Oh ! God ! God ! I pray for a sea of water, and a 
thousand devils all bring me fire ! Oh ! I am in fire and 
flame !" 

He continued alternately raving and silently insensible 
till about noon, when the boy came to tell me he was asleep. 
So rapid and fierce had been the fever, giving no respite, 
that my mind misgave me, and I went down into the cabin. 
I shuddered as I beheld him ; the distorted features, 
pinched and puckered up, expanded nostrils, glassy and 
half-closed eye, the pallid hue of his skin touched and 
streaked with blue, the ghastly and collapsed hand, and 
nerveless arm hanging down, all indicated that he had struck 
his flag to the grisly pirate-king. Death's gray banner 
hung drooping over him. I held a mirror to his livid lips, 
— there was not a breath to stain it. Decay too, as if not 
brooking an instant's reprieve, had begun its work, ere the 
spark of fire, which animated his clay, was extinguished. 
Scarcely had I time, while standing over him, to brush 
away the moisture gathering on my eyelids with the back 
of my hand when the doctor of the frigate, who stood by 



A YOUNGER SON. 38 1 

me, putting his hand on my arm, said, " Are you deaf, 
captain ? Don't you hear me ? I tell you, if you won't 
cast the body overboard immediately, yours will be prey 
for the dog-fish to-morrow." 

Ci What ! " I exclaimed, " the warm hearted, honest, 
kind, and jovial Louis, the life of the ship's company, the 
best servant man ever had, food for dog-fish and sharks — 
thrown overboard like a rotten sheep, ere we are certain 
that life has totally abandoned him ! Feel, — he is yet 
warm ! It shall not be done ! " 



CHAPTER XIV. 

And even and morn, 
With their hammocks for coffins, the seamen aghast, 
Like dead men, the dead limbs of their comrades cast 
Down the deep. Shelley 

The doctor returned to his ship. At the expiration of a 
few hours I was convinced the advice he gave, though it 
sounded harshly at the time, was nevertheless true and 
good; for the decomposition was miraculously rapid, and the 
atmosphere of the vessel, previously insufferably close, be- 
came tainted. It would have been unsafe, a few hours later, 
to approach the body ; so I gave orders to have it sewed 
up in a hammock, the sailor's coffin, with a couple of heavy 
shot secured at the lower extremities. Then, having 
lowered it in a boat, and covered it with a flag of his 
country for a pall, I pulled far outside of the harbour to sink 
it, in compliance with an order that no corpse was to be 
buried in or near the port. I would have read the burial- 
service over him, if such a thing as a book of prayer could 
have been procured ; but priests and prayer-books were 
scarce articles, — indeed not to be come at on board the 
schooner ; and if wandering souls are bored in the other 
world for passports, as they are in a great part of this, I 
pity them. We fired three volleys over the remains of 



382 ADVENTURES OF 

Louis, and committed the body to the deep. Watching it 
as it sunk, with a heavy heart, I gave the order to pull 
the boat's bow round, and give way on board ; when, with 
my eyes fixed on the rippling, which broke the glassy sur- 
face of the sea, I muttered, <c Poor Louis ! poor Louis ! 

I would give the world to have thee here ag ha ! what's 

that? Lie on your oars !" The men turned round, and 
all together exclaimed, " By God ! he is up again ! " 

And so it was. My musing had been interrupted by 
beholding the body rise on the surface, like a spar, which 
had been hurled in the sea end foremost from a height, 
when the reaction sends it back again, almost into the air, 
and then it lies floating on the waters. The boat was 
crowded with men, anxious to see the last of him by at- 
tending his funeral, for he was a general favourite. We 
were all so astonished that the cause of this re-appearance, 
—to wit, the shot not being properly secured from falling 
out — never once occurred to any of us. We pulled 
round and hurried back to the spot, as eagerly as if it 
were to rescue a drowning comrade. Indeed some of the 
crew were for hauling the body into the boat, to examine 
if it was not re-animated. On discovering that the ballast 
had escaped from the lashings, we were at a stand- still what 
to do. To leave the body afloat is sacrilege among sailors, 
as depriving it of Christian burial. We had nothing but 
the boat's iron grapnel, heavy enough for the purpose ; so 
we were obliged to expend it. This was securely lashed, 
and the body again sank, every one, I believe, anticipating 
its re-appearance ; for, as one of the old man-of-war's men 
sagely and oraculously observed, " I '11 be damned if all 
the anchors in the dock-yard of Portsmouth would moor 
that Dutch dogger under water ; because as how he never 
let that stuff enter his scuppers in his life, and it arn't 
natural to him, howsomever, though he be dead," 

I had laid the schooner as far on the outside of the port 
as our convenience and security would permit, to be away 
from the noxious vapours of the land, and to have as much 
benefit from the sea-breeze as possible. Yet the malady 
was spreading on board ; the symptoms of illness, and, as 
it turned out, the rapidity of dissolution, being nearly 



A YOUNGER SON. 383 

similar to poor Louis's. During a great part of the night 
I was attending to the sick ; and afterwards I was kept 
awake, revolving in' my mind what was best to be done in 
order to avert the pestilence from spreading ; — whether it 
was not advisable, leaving my business unfinished, instantly 
to proceed to some other port for provisions, fearful, if I 
delayed it, that the alternative of moving or staying would 
not be left to my decision. My drunken doctor had de- 
serted me ; at any other period I should have been glad of 
it, but I had not yet succeeded in finding another. I had 
few medicines, and was unlearned in their use ; though 
De Ruyter had taken pains to instruct me in so important 
a part of my duty. Eight of the crew were very ill. After 
consulting with the two mates, we came to this conclusion, — 
to cut and run as soon as daylight appeared. I then retired, 
harassed and exhausted, to recruit my strength by sleep. 

At daybreak the man-of-war's man, to whom I alluded 
on the previous evening, came down in the cabin, and, 
disturbing me from a heavy sleep, said, C( Captain, he's 
afloat again, and alongside. Is he to come aboard, sir ? " 

Rubbing my glued eyelids, I answered, iC Yes, — let 
him come aboard. Who is it ? " 

" Why, it be he, sir." 

"He! Who?" 

iC The steward, sir ! " 

" Steward ! What steward ? " 

u Old Louis, sir." 

I shook myself, and jumped up, to be certain I was 
awake; and the mate continued with, " Didn't I say as 
how, sir, he wo'nt lay moored under water ? " 

Accompanying him on deck, he pointed out the canvass- 
shrouded body of Louis lying across the schooner's bow, 
seemingly supported by the cable. The men all pressed 
forward to gaze in wonder and awe. At this apparently 
miraculous second re-appearance, I was really as much 
astounded as the crew. The grapnel had been securely 
lashed, and had often held the boat in a swell, while there 
had been neither sea nor wind during the night. On ex- 
amination the mystery was explained : the ground-sharks 
had been at work, and, by dragging and tearing, had torn 



384 ADVENTURES OF 

the hammock apart to get at the body, which was horribly 
mauled, and from which a leg had been separated, the 
canvass having protected the upper part. I now resolved 
to inter the remains on shore ; but they were offensive to 
handle, and I had no planks for a coffin. After some 
hesitation, I could contrive nothing better than to tow the 
body ashore, and inter it in a deep hole, prepared by the 
second mate in the sand, above high- water mark. u For," 
said he, " if he feels the water touch him, call me a land- 
lubber if he don't slip his cable, get under weigh again, 
make sail, and get alongside of us, wheresomever we be ; 
so I '11 give him a dry, snug berth." As this was undeni- 
able, we parbuckled Louis into his shore-grave; and to 
make assurance doubly sure, we hauled the broken bottom 
of a wrecked boat, which lay near the spot, to cover the 
grave with it, so that either from above or below, he was 
secured against water. 



CHAPTER XV. 

'T is true they are a lawless brood, 

But rough in form, nor mild in mood ; 

And every creed, and every race, 

With them hath found — may find a place. Byron, 

Preparatory to going to sea, I called on the governor, 
and merchants with whom I had business, obtained my 
clearances, paid my bills and port-charges, had my papers 
signed, &c. &c. ; then loading a couple of shore-boats with 
all the fresh provisions I could lay my hands on, I returned 
on board, fired a gun, and hoisted the signal for sailing. 

We had been in port only four days, during which there 
had been a dead calm. The town, like Venice, is inter- 
sected by canals, which, being receptacles for all the filth 
of the crowded population of the place, mud and dead dogs 
were dammed up at the outlets, and this was the principal 



A YOUNGER SON. 385 

cause of the sickness. The interior of the island, and the 
mountains close to the town, were and are very healthy ; 
but the town itself is almost annually ravaged by what is, 
par excellence, called the Java fever. The youngs strong, 
and florid-complexioned were generally the first attacked, 
and the soonest despatched. The great feeders and fat- 
buttocked never escaped. I loathe greasy and haunchy 
brutes, as Moses and Mahommet loathed swine, and rejoice 
in their extermination — all except honest, honest Louis, 
whose warm heart no mounds of suet could impede in its 
free beating, or choke its generous .impulses. Gout, apo- 
plexy, dropsy, and the stone, I laud, respect, and salute 
with my hat off; for they are, in their nature, radicals, 
the fierce slayers of kings and priests, jthe grasping wealthy 
and the greedy glutton. When the parson robs the poor 
cottager of his corn and tithe-pigs, though his conscience 
may never prick him, his great toe often does ; and the 
porkling never ceases to grunt within him, till, incorporated 
on his ribs, or laying fast hold on his throat, he exhibits 
apodictical indications of apoplexy. Among us, those of 
the greyhound race, the broad-chested, long, limbed, bright- 
eyed, gaunt, and spare-bodied, were rarely pursued or 
seized on by those bloodhounds, fever and dysentery, no 
matter what their habits of living were. Our carpenter, a 
staunch sea-dog, drank, with measured accuracy, half a 
gallon of arrack a day, and worked like a steam-engine. 
You might track him along the deck by the moisture exud- 
ing from him ; and though he had been thus drinking and 
and toiling for years, the first to begin labour, and the last 
to desist from it, the oldest man on board, and the longest 
in India, his health and strength were unimpaired — as 
little affected as a machine by heat and change. Day or 
night he toiled on, and wondered when others grew sick, 
died, and abandoned their post. He instanced me as a 
chip of the same block, and fit to command, for I was 
always to be found at my duty. 

With my mingled, wild, and savage crew, the outcasts 
of the west, and those who had lost caste in the east — men 
whom the iron hand of the law could neither hold in sub- 
jection nor tame, whose tiger-hearts knew no ties of kindred, 
c G 



S86 ADVENTURES OP 

home, and country, or, if known, they were rudely rent 
asunder — my duty was no sinecure. More than once my 
power was in imminent jeopardy, notwithstanding De Ruy- 
ter's precautions in having backed me with a force of old 
and tried men of his own, the several Europeans I had 
added to my crew, who were attached to me, and Zeia's 
faithful and devoted Arabs ; I say, with all this, such was 
the unmitigable ferocity of some of my men, that I was fre- 
quently in great personal peril, and my destruction was plot- 
ted. Zela, by means of the Malay girl I had bought from 
her affectionate mother, and her Arabs, were my salvation, 
by putting me on my guard in giving me timely notice of 
every thing going on. Besides, the first mate, the Ameri- 
can, was my firm friend, being bound to De Ruyter by 
the strret ties of mutual interest — the only hold that man 
has on man's fidelity. But we had a ruffianly set of law- 
less Frenchmen, brindle-bearded privateer's men, and smug- 
glers, fellows with long knives in their girdles, and of such 
fiery and irascible tempers that their hands, as by instinct, 
Were generally on the hafts, while their grey and assassin- 
like eyes glared ferociously at the slightest provocation. 
Their jealous and malignant natures ill brooked the parti- 
ality they fancied I showed towards my countrymen and the 
natives, and there were continual broils and civil conten- 
tions on board. A leader of this gang had one day an 
altercation with the American mate, who was a quiet and 
somewhat timid man, and threateningly drew his knife on 
him. I was in the cabin, and overheard the contention. 
Having long been irritated at this man's conduct (for he 
was the organ of all the refractory Frenchmen), I started 
from Zela's lap, on which my head was lying, rushed on 
deck, and confronted the fellow. He stood his ground 
without flinching, his knife still held out. Our eyes met, 
gladiator-like, in defiance, as I put my hand to draw the 
small creese from my waist, exclaiming, " A mutiny ! — 
seize the villain ! " We rushed on each other : he called 
out to his countrymen, and there was a wild commotion. 
I felt his knife on my left arm and ribs, before I could 
unsheath my weapon. I made no effort to ward off the 
blow, but grasped his brawny throat with one hand, and 



A YOUNGER SON. 387 

putting the creese behind his left shoulder, in the Malay 
fashion, drove it right down through his heart, and we fell 
together on a gun-carriage on the deck. 

As I rose, every muscle in my body writhed, like a 
wounded serpent, with rage. I killed this man, not from 
the instigation of sudden passion, though in passion ; for, 
young and fiery as I was, I could controul myself ; but I 
had premeditated the ruffian's death, after using every 
means to conciliate him. He was the boatswain, the har- 
diest sailor on board, and as insensible to fear as a buffalo. 
He hated the English, and I hated him on account of a 
story he was in the habit of narrating with savage glee. 
Once he had been mate in a small craft running between 
the Isle of France and Madagascar, trading for cattle. 
The vessel was captured by an English sloop of war, when 
a midshipman, with five or six men, were put in charge of 
her. This fellow and two of his crew were left on board, 
and were imprudently permitted by the midshipman to 
assist in working the vessel, instead of being confined as 
prisoners. One calm midnight, the officer and most of his 
men being asleep, he crept into the cabin and cut the mid- 
shipman's throat ; then, assisted by the other two (one an 
African), they massacred all the others, threw their bodies 
into the sea, and returned to the Isle of France, glorying 
in their bloody and successful atrocity. This story I had 
heard him repeat on the previous night, and could scarcely 
then restrain my indignation. 

Stretching forth my red hand, with the dripping weapon, 
I roared out to the gathering Frenchmen, who stood near- 
est to me and together, " Go to your duty ! There is 
your mutinous leader; — and thus will I serve all those that 
dare disobey me \" 

Zeis, stood by my side, holding my sword for me. Her 
soft eye had changed its hue, and the fire of her race shone 
in her bright glances. The disorderly Frenchmen sullenly 
went forward; and the rest of the crew silently leant 
about in groups. From this time my influence with the 
men was considerably augmented, the growing insubordi- 
nation received a check, and my youth, the principal plea 
urged against me by the refractory, was forgotten. 
o c 2 



S88 ADVENTURES OF 



CHAPTER XVI. 

It was so calm, that scarce the feathery weed 

Sown by some eagle on the topmost stone 

Swayed in the air. Shelley. 

We ran along the eastern coast for a bay, in which, 
according to my chart, there was anchorage, with the 
intention of procuring a supply of wood and water. We 
kept as close in-shore as possible, to be within reach of the 
land-winds ; but, for many days we lay stationary under 
the high land, within whose dark shadows I thought 
we were enchanted ; for not a breath of air reached us, 
either from the land at night, or from the sea in the day. 
The buoyant rubbish of chips, feathers, and rope-yarn, 
thrown overboard, remained as stationary as the rubbish 
cast out of a cottage door. The waters seemed petrified 
into polished blue marble, tempting one to walk on their 
treacherous surface. Among the few moving things around 
were those little azure- tinctured children of the sea, called 
Portuguese men of war, with sails light as gossamer, and 
tiny paddles; they manoeuvred about us, like a fairy fleet, 
the largest as big as the chrystal stopper of a decanter, 
which, except in colour, they resembled. Here and there 
were scattered the jellied-looking sea-stars ; and a singular 
phenomenon, called the puree, which comes from the 
bottom to the surface by inflating itself with air, till, from 
a shrunken, withered, empty thing, it becomes round and 
plumped out like a blown bladder; after this, it cannot 
sink for a length of time. We amused ourselves by prac- 
tising with our carbines at them ; and also by lowering the 
square sail overboard to bathe in, using that method to avoid 
the ground- sharks, which, in those seas, near the shore, lie 
like silent watch-dogs in their submerged kennels. The 
heat was so piercing, that the Raypoots, who worship the 
sun, fought on the deck for a square foot of the awnings 
shade. I experienced the greatest relief from anointing 
my body with oil, and continually, like a duck, plunging 



A YOUNGER SON. 389 

my head in water ; yet my lips and skin were cracked like 
a plum-tree. No vessel is so ill adapted for a hot climate 
as a schooner ; she requires a great many men to work her, 
and has less space than any other vessel wherein to stow 
them. On coming on deck from below, the men appeared 
as if they had emerged from a steam-hath. 

However, calms at sea, like the calms of life, are tran- 
sitory and far between ; a breeze, a squall, a gale, or a 
tempest must follow, as certain as the night the day. With 
us the winds came gentle as a lover's voice to woo the sleeping 
canvass, not like the simoom of wedlock, and we glided 
peacefully along the rich and varied scenery of the shore 
to our anchorage near Balamhua, withinside the island of 
Abaran. Here we found an extensive range of sandy 
beach, a small river, and the wood so abundant, that the 
trees seemed enamoured of salt water and sea breezes, 
drooping their heads over its surface, as if they courted its 
spray, and were nurtured by the briny waves laving their 
roots. There was a small village of Javanese at the mouth 
of the river, the chief of which, in consideration of a small 
supply of powder and brandy, readily gave us permission 
to procure what we wanted on shore. We landed our 
empty water-casks, and began to cut wood. 

The calms, the excessive heat, the closeness of the 
atmosphere, all combined to spread the fever and dysentery 
among the crew ; and few days passed without our losing 
a man. JEther, opium, and calomel were the medicines, 
by my instructions, to be applied to those attacked ; and 
bark and wine to the convalescent. Something I had learnt 
of the diseases of the country, yet I regretted I had not 
been more attentive to Van's medical lectures. Now, 
without a surgeon, I pored over one of Van's medical 
books, and lamented that my old schoolmaster had not suc- 
ceeded in whipping Latin into me. Horses and dogs, 
thought I, are educated by beating ; and why not man, 
the more obdurate and vicious animal? Latin phrases 
were hieroglyphics to me. Yet I proceeded to practise, 
though without wig, amber -headed cane, or stop-watch, as 
a mask for gross ignorance, and turned to drugging and 
drenching with as little compunction as the members of the 
oo 3 



3QQ ADVENTURES OF 

Royal College of Physicians, who write M.D. to their 
names, which, I shall ever presume, means " Man Des- 
troyers." 

Preparing for sea, I was amazed to hear that a fray had 
happened between some of our men and the villagers. Two 
of the natives had been wounded by our men firing at 
them. These disputes were ever recurring in our dealings ; 
nor could our tars comprehend that they were amenable to 
any law while on shore. They acknowledged themselves 
when shipped, bound to the articles of their duty, and 
answerable for any neglect or breach of contract while on 
board. They belonged to the sea; but "it is damned 
hard if we can 't take our full swing on shore. We are 
ready to pay for what we want, — when we have money ; 
or we are ready to fight for it. For when we haven't 
money, it an't natural that savages should keep all the 
shore to themselves ; when it is quite sartain the land was 
made for the Christians as well as the sea." This, or some 
such reasoning, was all the reply I could get, from my most 
orthodox Christian crew, to my frequent remonstrances on 
the brutality with which they assailed, robbed, and slaugh- 
tered the natives. Nor could I find a remedy for this evil ; 
I restrained them as much as possible, and did what justice 
was in my power, in the way of recompence, to the wronged. 
In this instance the Javanese were accused of being the 
aggressors; yet, though I could not arrive at the facts, I 
knew some indignity must have been offered to them ; and 
they are neither patient nor forgiving. Dreading therefore 
some bloody retaliation, and observing they no longer came 
alongside of us, while a suspension of barter and commu- 
nication was highly detrimental, I took a few presents for 
the chief, and went on shore in two armed boats. This 
method did not succeed ; but, by going accompanied by 
none but my interpreter, after much difficulty and expla- 
nation, I succeeded, at least in appearance, in having 
accommodated the affair, when a renewal of our friendly 
intercourse took place. 

When ready for sea, the chief came on board, and press- 
ed me to accompany him to a hunting station, abounding 
with deer and wild hogs. He had often heard me express 



A YOUXGER SON. 391 

a wish to go thither, but had put it off from time to time, 
saying it was better to wait till the rains fell, when the 
animals would be driven down from the mountains. As 
there had been a violent storm on the previous night, fol- 
lowed by floods of rain, his invitation seemed to be the 
consequence of his former promise. 1 readily gave my 
assent. He cautioned me, with great apparent sincerity, 
against creating any jealous fears among his people by a 
train of many armed followers. Then, with other friendly 
advice on his part, we parted ; it being settled that I was to 
meet him on the ensuing morning before day-light. 



CHAPTER XVII. 

There sat the gentle savage of the wild, 

In growth a woman, though in years a child, 

As childhood dates within our colder clime. 

Where nought is ripenM rapidly save crime. Byro.v. 

Although without fear, I did not neglect to use all proper 
precautions. I went on shore the next morning with 
fourteen of my trustiest men, well armed. After landing, 
I ordered the boat, with a smaller one which accompanied 
us, having a part of their crews, to push off from the shore, 
lie at their grapnels, and, on no account, to land, or parley 
with the natives. 

The chief was waiting for me, attended by only four or 
Ave men, armed with merely their creeses and boar-spears. 
We penetrated into the interior by following the windings 
of the little river, now swollen, muddy, and rapid, from 
the late heavy rain. We crossed the stream several times 
by fords, not without some difficulty, and I failed not to 
caution our party to preserve their ammunition and arms 
from getting wet. I had learnt to be watchful and suspi- 
cious, and took note of several apparently trivial cir- 
cumstances, which might have escaped a less wary 
person. The Javanese chief frequently held conferences 
c c 4 



§92 ADVENTURES OF 

with his men ; he sometimes wished us to cross parts of 
the river which were not fordable, the bottom being muddy, 
interspersed with deep holes ; and, changing the order of 
our progress, he kept in the rear of the party. Upon this 
I also fell back, and watched him narrowly. There was 
awakened a cunning and treacherous expression in the 
glistening of his small deep-set eye, which startled me. 
Not to let him imagine he was mistrusted, I determined, 
as we had already advanced two or three miles, to proceed 
without pause, keeping near him, and carefully watching 
his motions. At the same time I accurately noted our 
road, the localities which marked our progress, and the 
fords of the river. 

I cannot remember to have ever benefited by the advice 
or example of others. Nothing but a blow from the Cy- 
clopean hammer of experience on my head could teach or 
convince me ; and nothing less than the imminent jeopardy 
in which I had placed Zela, by taking her to the tiger- 
hunt, contrary to every one's advice and all prudent con- 
sideration, could have induced me to leave her on board 
tlie schooner, against her own urgent entreaty to accompany 
me. That I now knew her to be in that safe asylum, by 
removing every care and fear from my mind, seemed to 
leave my whole body invulnerable. I had yielded, how- 
ever, to Zela's importunities to take her little, intelligent 
Malayan girl, Adoo, in whom her mistress placed implicit 
confidence. Adoo neither cared nor thought about any 
thing in the world but Zela. Her attachment to me was 
grounded on being beloved by Zela. Adoo was nearly of 
the same age as her mistress, but no two creatures could 
be more dissimilar. The Malayan girl was stunted in 
growth, broad and bony, low-browed, with hair coarse, 
straight, and black, hanging oyer her flat tawny face, like 
a wild horse's foretop. Her small and deep-set eyes, by 
their unusual distance, seemed totally independent of each 
other, and to have power to keep a look-out to the star- 
board and larboad, the north and the south, at the same 
instant. They were bright, watchful, and eager as a 
serpent's, — but there ended the resemblance ; for poor 
little Adoo, far from wile and guile, was the truest and 



A YOUNGER SON. 3Q8 

most faithful handmaiden that ever dedicated herself to a 
mistress, hand and heart. I was so partial to this little 
savage, that to keep her about my person, I installed her 
in the high and important office of Tchibookdgee; and she 
was matchless in compounding a chilan for a hooka, pre- 
paring a callian, or filling a Turkish pipe, — accomplish- 
ments not to be despised. 

To return to my story. We continued our route by the 
side of the river for about four miles, when, after ascend- 
ing an abrupt and rocky eminence, our Javanese leader 
proposed to stop at two or three small cane-huts, and refresh 
ourselves with coffee and mangosteens, till some of the 
people he had sent forward should return to inform us 
where the game lay. To this I gladly acceded. My 
suspicions were in a great measure dissipated, seeing no 
further symptoms to corroborate those which had been 
lurking in my mind. Milk, fruit, and coffee, which last is 
of excellent quality in this island, were brought. Adoo, 
for I was a great epicure in coffee, superintended the 
making of mine. We were seated in one of the empty huts, 
to screen us from the sun ; and w T hilst I was smoking my 
callian, the men were eating and drinking. The chief was 
sitting on a mat close by me, between me and the door, 
which was blocked up by Javanese. I was on the point of 
putting the coffee-cup to my lips with my left hand, as I 
leaned on my right, and lolled at the full stretch of my 
limbs, with my head resting against one of the bamboo- 
supporters of the hut, when my attention was directed to 
something touching my hand. Turning to see what it 
was, a low voice on the outside, but close to my ear, said, 
cc Hush ! hush ! do not move ! " in such accents as 
evidently indicated terror. Without moving, I glanced my 
eye in the direction of the voice, and it fell on the keen 
glance of Adoo, through the matting. I leaned my head 
close to the spot, when she whispered in my ear, " Do 
not drink the coffee ; — come out ; — bad people ! " 

Some of our men had complained of sickness imme- 
diately after they had drank the coffee ; and I recollected 
the officiousness of the chief in serving me with it. In- 
stantly it struck me it was poisoned. Happily I had 



394 ADVENTURES OF 

been detained from drinking it, awaiting the somewhat 
tedious process of preparing, filling, and lighting my 
Persian water-pipe. The chief, now at the door, was 
significantly exchanging glances with his men, or every 
eye was fixed on me ; their savage and malign aspects 
plainly intimated their intentions. There was neither time 
nor opportunity to form plans or communicate with my 
men. Suspecting, which was the case, that the chief was 
waiting for a reinforcement to attack us, and fearing, from 
the rising commotion withoutside, they had already arrived, 
and would, whilst my men were under the paralysing 
effect of the poison, rush in and hutcher us, or fire the 
huts, and slaughter us as we attempted to escape, I drew a 
pistol, sprang up, and attempted to gain the entrance. 
The chief drew his creese, and essayed to detain me. I 
shot him through the body, and yelled the Arab war-cry, 
calling out to the men, " We are betrayed — - follow 
me ! " 

So sudden had been my movement that the panic-struck 
natives rushed down the bank into the jungle. Restrain- 
ing my men from pursuing them, my orders were to 
examine if their arms were ready for service, and to fix 
their bayonets. Adoo told me, from what she had over- 
heard, some fatal or stupifying drug had been administered 
to the men in their coffee ; and that the chief was waiting 
for a reinforcement. Many of the men were affected, com- 
plaining of sickness. 



CHAPTER XVIII. 



Not the eagle more 
Loves to beat up against a tyrannous blast 
Than I to meet the torrent of my foes. 
This is a brag ! —be it so ; but, if I fall, 
Carve it upon my 'scutcheon 'd sepulchre. Keats' MS. 

The the first danger was over, yet was our situation most 
perilous. We set off, in double quick time, to regain the 



A YOUNGER SON. 3$5 

boats, or to get in sight of the schooner, and give signals 
of our distress. We regained the river, and crossed it. 
Naturally concluding the natives would lurk in ambush to 
cut us off, I carefully avoided the route by which we had 
advanced in the morning, and kept on the highest and the 
clearest ground. By these precautions we succeeded in 
retreating three parts of the distance unimpeded, but not 
unobserved ; as, from time to time, we heard the wild war- 
whoops of the enemy, hanging on our rear. As long as 
they remained there we had little to fear. Adoo, who ran 
close at my heels, kept a look-out on both sides, continually 
pointing at the direction the natives were taking, with ex- 
traordinary precision. As we proceeded, in addition to the 
danger of becoming embogged, was the probability of being 
attacked at such a disadvantage. At length arriving at an 
angle of the river, with a swampy morass before us, we were 
compelled to cross. Whether the strong stimulant of 
fear or uncommon physical exertion had neutralized or re- 
tarded the effect of the poison, or the inefficacy of the drug 
itself was the cause of its effects having disappeared, I 
know not ; but, after the first half-hour, I heard no more 
about it. 

Bent on the one momentous object of regaining our 
vessel, I led the party across the river, feeling my way and 
supporting myself with a boar-spear. We secured our 
cartridges in our caps. The water was shallow, but vary- 
ing in depth, and the passage difficult from its treacherous 
coatings of soft, black, and slippery mud. Happily my- 
self and five others achieved a firmer footing and shallower 
water, after having with difficulty toiled along up to the 
hips, when Adoo said, " Malik, they are coming ! " I 
lowered my carbine to my shoulder, and called to the re- 
mainder of the men to hasten on. The natives, emerging 
from their ambush, gave a loud yell, fired their match- 
locks, and ran tumultuously down to the river's brink. In 
all savage warfare, the first shout and the first volley are 
to give themselves courage to advance, and to intimidate 
and panic-strike their opponents ; like yelping dogs, which 
pursue what flies, but sneak from the sturdy ; therefore if 
lie first aimless discharge and war-cry are unshrinkingly 



3yO ADVENTURES OF 

replied to and defied, the attack is rendered weak and 
wavering. The Javanese, seeing we stood firm, and pre- 
pared to fire on them, paused on the river's brink. Ob- 
serving their hesitation we, that were in front, gave them 
a volley ; and, the other men coming up, we shouted, and 
advanced rapidly to the shore to charge them. They re- 
treated into the jungle, and we succeeded in crossing the 
ford without the loss of a man. 

We hurried down the margin of the stream, the natives 
following close in our rear, or flanking us, occasionally 
throwing spears, firing their matchlocks, and yelling 
obscure curses and threats ; to which we replied by a 
prompt shot the instant any of them became visible. The 
number of our pursuers was increasing, and, as we ap- 
proached the sea the jungle became thinner, when Adoo 
told me she saw horsemen advancing in our front. At 
that moment the odour of the sea-beach, impregnated as it 
was with dead weeds, rotten fish, and briny air, was in- 
haled by me with far greater rapture than ever fell to the 
lot of tobacco, or my favourite wines, hock, Bourdeaux, 
and Tokay. I called out to my men, iC Freshen your 
way, my boys, — the sea a-head ! " and they sped along to 
the bank on which I stood, with more alacrity than I ever 
saw them fly up the rigging to catch a view of land after a 
tedious voyage. When we espied the silken, swallow- tailed 
vanes, glittering on the trucks of our dark-hulled schooner, 
although the hull was not visible, we gave a loud hurrah, 
with a volley of muskquetry to our pursuers, and con- 
sidered, somewhat prematurely, our difficulties over. 

On the long line of sandy plain, bordering the sea, a 
dingy and confused mass stained its surface. A loud 
shout from the natives, dogging our heels, confirmed what 
Adoo's hawk's eyes had first descried, and which soon be- 
came distinct to us all. A body of native, and nearly 
naked, horsemen approached us at speed, armed with 
spears, and mounted on small, but swift and active horses. 
Their number was not great; but, backed by those who 
were already nearly surrounding us, they were enough to 
annihilate the hopes of the wisest, and to turn the thoughts 
of the best towards Heaven. But I was neither of the 



A YOUNGER SON. #97 

wise nor good ; all my thoughts were occupied in how best 
to meet the coming danger. 

A bank or bar was formed across the river, of mud and 
sand ; where the salt and fresh water met, and where, in 
storms, torrents from the mountains and the wild waves 
joined in conflict depositing their spoils. Old trunks of 
trees, and pieces of wrecked canoes were firmly imbedded 
in this bank, through which the current ebbed and flowed 
in narrow channels, the bottoms of which were deep on 
both sides of the river. There was a sandy level, a desert 
waste on our left ; close to the sea was the village, inter- 
spersed with clumps of the sea-loving cocoa-nut tree; and 
two or three clumps of these were dotted on our right, 
intercepting our view of the schooner. We had not time 
to occupy one of these groves, as the horsemen were rapidly 
approaching ; I therefore promptly took possession of the 
before-mentioned bar in the river. We accordingly 
retreated into the water, and, with some difficulty, suc- 
ceeded in establishing ourselves on the sandy ridges, having 
a good footing, and the water not deeper than the knees. 
The bank itself, with the rubbish on it, made a breast- 
work. I would have also occupied the opposite side, but 
our party was too small to be divided. I had still my 
fourteen men, two or three indeed slightly wounded, but 
not incapacitated from using their fire-arms. Besides other 
arms each man had a musket and bayonet, and our car- 
touch-boxes were nearly full ; for I had economised our 
ammunition, on which, I knew, every thing depended. 



CHAPTER XIX. 

That Saracenic meteor of the fight! 

'Tis a gallant enemy. 
How like a comet he goes streaming on. Keats' MS. 

Shrieking and yelling, our foes advanced. We crouched 
down in silence. These wild and savage-looking horsemen 



Jyb ADVENTURES OF 

were led on by their prince, mounted on a little fiery 
courser of a bright red colour, with a mane and tail flying 
in the air like streamers in a gale. The rider was the 
only one of the band turbaned, clothed, and armed from 
head to heel. His tattooed and stained features seemed 
on fire with impatience to begin the slaughter. The 
energetic ferocity with which he glanced at our small 
numbers reminded me of our Borneo friend running a 
muck. The horse, inspired by the fiend on his back, kept 
in perpetual and rapid motion. The prince dashed in the 
water, fired a pistol at one, threw a lance at another, 
sprang to the shore, led on the horsemen, wheeled round, 
yelled at those skulking on shore, drove those on foot with 
his sword into the river, crossed it himself, recrossed, 
headed the natives on foot, and then resumed his place, 
leading, urging, and forcing the horsemen on us ; while his 
horse, foaming and panting, did not for an instant slacken 
his rapid, springy, and mazy motions. Following him 
with my eye, and with my carbine resting on the bulk of 
a tree, behind which I was screened, I fired several shots 
at him ; but in vain, — a swallow in the air, or a sea-gull 
riding on a wave, tempest-rocked, would have been as 
difficult a mark. Yet so favourable was the position we 
held for defence, and so cool and well-directed the fire we 
kept up, that all the efforts of the natives, impelled on by 
their meteor-like prince, were unable to dislodge us. But 
our ammunition was nearly expended; two men were killed, 
and others of our little band incapacitated by wounds. On 
the other hand, we had made great havoc amongst the 
natives, whose exposed situation gave us great advantage. 
The cavalry, who acted with the highest intrepidity, dash- 
ing into the river both above and below us, suffered severely 
from our fire ; but more from the heavy mud on one side, 
and the deep holes, sunken trees, and spars on the other. 
Besides, except their prince, they had no fire-arms ; but 
his devil's spirit seemed to be infused in them, and their 
screams were terrific. However, they could not reach us 
with their spears, and we slaughtered them in security. It 
was only by destroying them, or thinning their number, 
that we could hope to escape. 



A "FOUNGER SON. 399 

The time at which it was indispenable to make a desper- 
ate effort to land, and endeavour to regain the beach, was 
at hand. Luckily for us, the only passable ford at this 
point was where the horsemen could not, from the nature 
of the ground, oppose us, though a host of villagers with- 
stood our passage. In this predicament, worn with toil, 
and almost exhausted, I cautiously, one by one, drew my 
men to the opposite bank, which, when perceived by the 
natives, they gathered down, and closed on us. The horse- 
men, whose number was greatly diminished, galloped off 
towards the sea, as I concluded, to cross and cut off our 
retreat. We were under the painful necessity of leaving 
two of the wounded. The first man who landed was 
killed by a stone from a sling, which was driven into the 
skull ; so that our party was now reduced to nine, in- 
cluding myself. To quench their burning thirst, the men 
had drank freely of the brackish w r ater of the stream, which 
had made them sick ; and their standing in the water, 
under the piercing rays of the sun, had so affected them, 
that, on their landing, they staggered about as if they were 
drunk. 

It was still about a mile to the sea. Keeping close 
together, we left the ford, and, skirting the river's bank, 
proceeded onwards. The natives crossed, and dogged our 
heels in multitudes, which obliged us occasionally to halt, 
and check their advance by a volley. At last we opened a 
view of the schooner's hull, and the drooping and stagger- 
ing men breathed a new life. Our hopes were now san- 
guine, when a cloud of sand uprose before us, which, 
partially withdrawn by the wind, exhibited to our view 
the vampy re-prince, and his bright-red, fiery, and foaming 
horse, looming through the vapoury mirage of the dazzling 
w r hite sand, like a centaur. 

A small cluster of palms, shadowing the roofless ruins 
of a mud hut, stood to our left : all around was a sandy 
waste. To reach this spot was our only hope : thither we 
ran for our lives, panting as if our hearts would burst, and 
threw ourselves over the walls of the hut. One of our 
wounded fell from exhaustion on the road. Hearing a 
yell, I looked behind^ and saw the malignant prince riding 



400 ADVENTURES OP 

over his body, and endeavouring to trample him to death. 
He then jumped from his horse, and, as if disdaining to 
use his sword, smashed the man's skull with the butt of 
his matchlock or musket, sprang on his horse, yelled to 
his men, and rode to within a hundred yards of us. The 
horsemen then separated, and galloped round and round 
the hut, till, nearing us, they hurled their lances, which 
we returned with a volley. Two or three of the best shots, 
with myself, singled out the prince, when I observed his 
horse swerve round, and go off with a staggering gait, 
while a plume of the bird of Paradise in his turban was 
scattered in the air. I thought our comrade's death avenged; 
but no such thing : the prince pulled up, dismounted, shook 
himself, and after surveying his steed, remounted, and was 
again in motion ; but his ardour appeared to be somewhat 
cooled. 

We now had but a cartridge or two a-piece, and were 
completely surrounded. Desponding, and well nigh ex- 
hausted, we prepared to sell our lives dearly by desperately 
sallying out. I thought of death — it seemed inevitable. 
De Ruyter crossed my mind ; but Zela's image drove him 
away, and totally engrossed all my thoughts, which were 
sad, for I believed they were my last. 

The back of the hut was high, and, under its shelter, 
the natives had approached close to us. We smelt fire, 
and drove a hole in the wall, with our bayonets, when we 
beheld they had gathered dry reeds and bushes, and had 
fired it. We drove them off; but to extinguish the flames 
was out of our power. In the front of the hut there were 
palnf-trees, surrounded by a hedge of vacoua, a strong, 
prickly, impervious fence. I had several times reproached 
myself for not having occupied this spot in preference to 
the hut, being equally secure against the horse, and giving 
us room to act, with a better view of the proceedings of 
the natives. Luckily, the front of the hut formed one 
side of this enclosure, to which it opened as to a court- 
yard, and had therefore prevented the natives from entering 
it. The Javanese prince was impelling the savages to 
close in, and oppose our leaving the hut. My men had 
been murmuring at the predicament into which I had led 



A YOUNGER SON. 40 J 

them,, and followed my injunctions hesitatingly and tardily 
to form themselves outside the hut in line 5 to drive the 
enemy, now close upon us, hack with the bayonet. 



CHAPTER XX. 

Because I think my lord, he is no man, 

But a fierce demon 'nointed safe from harm. Keats' MS. 

At that moment the low thundering sound of a heavy gun 
seawards saluted our ears,— it was the schooner's! Its 
effect was magical ; my glowing and desponding men 
brightened up, threw their caps in the air, and wildly gave 
tongue like a pack of hounds. It was the signal of succour 
nigh, — a sound that restored the dead to life. Another 
gun was fired ; and while the natives were astounded at 
its echo from the jungle and the hills, we rushed out 
amongst them, drove them panic-struck before us, and 
threw ourselves under cover of the palms. With a busy 
and cheerful alacrity the men took up their appointed 
stations, and, shaking hands, swore to defend themselves 
against ail odds. Yet still the foiled barbarians were forced 
upon us by their prince and leader, who, with unslackened 
courage, urged on his reeking horse from point to point. 
We had but five or six cartridges remaining amongst us, 
and trusted alone to our bayonets. The natives, observing 
that no succour was near us, and that our fire was dis- 
continued, advanced close to the prickly hedge, and wounded 
several of our men through the branches. In reality, our 
situation was more hopeless than ever ; but most of the , 
horsemen had gone towards the sea, and the prince could 
not induce his followers to assault us, so much had they 
already suffered, or we should have fallen an easy prey. I 
began to imagine, what all my men had long believed, that 
the prince was the evil spirit, and invulnerable. 

Thus encircled like a scorpion girt with fire, we had 

D D 



402 ADVENTURES OF 

passed nearly an hour, — it seemed a thousand ! — when my 
attention was directed to the margin of the sea by the Ja- 
vanese, who all turned that way, and simultaneously yelled. 
Instantly I heard a fire of musketry, and a cloud of 
doubt, hanging over my mind, was dispelled. They were 
my crew, coming to our rescue. Our first impulse was to 
rush out and join them ; but we could not abandon the 
wounded. We shouted, and when I saw, by the crowd 
of natives collected in front of us, that our men were ap- 
proaching in the right point, up the bank of the river, and 
as soon as we caught a glimpse of the scarlet- capped Arabs, 
I gave signal of our position by firing my carbine ; upon 
which I distinctly heard the war-cry of my Arabs. The 
prince, with his now diminished troopers, was galloping 
and wheeling about them ; but I knew, by the continued 
and heavy fire, there was a force sufficient to repel any 
effort he might make. Yet did this undaunted leader, 
who, by the swarms gathered around him, seemed to have 
been reinforced, dispute with wonderful pertinacity their 
advance, so that they were frequently compelled to halt 
and fire. At length they approached the bank of the river 
on our flank, and, spreading in two bodies, advanced to 
our position. The natives retreated ; and in my impa- 
tience, I sprung over the enclosure, cap in hand, cheering 
my gallant crew ; when, ere I had proceeded half way to 
them, a light and bounding figure, with her loose vest and 
streaming air flying in the wind, and in speed like a swal- 
low, — (but oh ! how infinitely more welcome than that 
harbinger of spring and flowers !) — came all my joy, my 
hope, my happiness, my Zela ! She sprung into my arms; 
we clasped each other in speechless ecstacy, and there 
thrilled through my frame a rapture that swelled my heart 
and veins almost to bursting. The rude seamen forgot 
their danger, and looked on not unmoved. This, in an 
instant, was followed by, — " what cheer, captain?" — 
iC where are our messmates ?" — and more vociferous cries 
and questions from Zela's Arabs, mingled, from a multi- 
tude of voices, with shouts and blaspheming threats against 
ihe Javanese. 

Assisting our wounded along, we regained the bank of 



A YOUNGER SOX. 403 

the river, and continued our march to the shore in good 
order, small bodies of the natives hovering about us, but 
not impeding our progress. The prince and the main 
body of the armed natives were in advance of us, seemingly 
with the purpose of disputing our embarkation, or attack- 
ing the boats previously to our arrival. This urged us on, 
for I knew the schooner lay too far out to cover the boats 
with her guns ; but my second mate told me he had or- 
dered the boats to lie out at their grapnels, and that the 
long-boat had a carronade in it. We were worn out with 
hardship, suffering from hunger, and more from thirst. 
Zela alone, as a child of the desert, had thought of bring- 
ing water, which had been given to the wounded. The 
boats were evidently kept from the shore by the armed 
natives on the beach. The schooner was in sight, and 
getting under way to run nearer in. As we approached 
the beach, I drew up my men, broke the throng before us 
with a volley, and drove through them with the bayonet ; 
when the boats pushed in to the mouth of the river, and 
we succeeded in getting the wounded into them. But, as 
the men were following, the natives renewed their attack, 
and several of our men were killed in disorderly skirmishes 
in the water. The long-boat, full of men, was fast grounded 
in the mud, and the melee was hand to hand. The creeses 
of the natives were better weapons than our muskets ; 
besides, our cartridge-boxes were full of water, and the 
confusion was so great, there being neither order nor com- 
mand, that we were in imminent peril. We could not 
stand on the slimy bottom of the water, stained with mud, 
and incrimsoned with blood, and, in struggling, the men 
fell, when the natives stabbed them under water. Having 
placed Zela in the long-boat, aided by two or three steady 
men, the natives crowding round and holding on the gun- 
wale, we discharged the carronade loaded with grape-shot. 
This made them pause, and gave our men time to rally. 
A second discharge cleared a space on the beach, and en* 
abled us to get the boats afloat. 

I was standing in the bow of the boat, with the match 
in my hand ; the bow was hanging on a sand-bank, whence 
the men were shoving her. The natives were scattered, 
d d 2 



404 ADVENTURES OF 

and flying in terror of the cannon, and the beach was 
strewed with dead and dying, when the invulnerable prince, 
with unabated fury, headed, and led on half a dozen horse- 
men, who stopped on seeing the engine, whose roar they 
so much dreaded, pointing directly on them. Turning 
round, the prince spoke some energetic words to them ; 
then, with a shout, and an expression of scorn and daring, 
he forced his bright red horse along the sand-bank, up to 
the bow of the boat, point-blank before the gun. I blew 
the match, and touched the priming, — it did not ignite. 
The prince dashed his turban in my face, and discharged 
a pistol at me. Whilst I was staggering from the shock, 
Zela promptly grasped the match, which had dropped from 
my hand, and fired the gun. A wailing scream arose along 
the beach from the Javanese. A wounded horse was madly 
plunging and trampling on his now prostrate rider, — but 
that was not the prince. Further on, just on the margin 
of the red surge, lay a mass of mutilated remains, huddled 
darkly together ; — a human leg and a horse's, hands and 
hoofs, the garments of a man and the garniture of a horse, 
blackened with powder, and red with blood. Yet was 
there enough to identify the best horse that warrior ever 
mounted, and the most heroic warrior that ever led to 
battle. 



CHAPTER XXI. 

A little shallop, floating there bard by, 

Pointed its beak over the fringed bank ; 

And soon it lightly dipt, and rose, and sank, 

And dipt again with the young couple's weight. Keats. 

I felt myself severely wounded, without knowing where 
the ball had entered. Unable to move my lower extremi- 
ties, a dull and torpid sensation crept throughout my frame. 
On looking downwards, I saw that my garments, from the 
right side to the hip, were rent and stained with powder, 



A YOUNGER SON. 405 

and that my loose cotton trowsers were on fire. No 
bleeding could be discerned. I lay down on the thwarts 
of the boat, now afloat, and, the natives having entirely 
discontinued their opposition, we left the shore. The 
schooner was standing in, keeping up a desultory fire over 
the beach. With returning sensibility, the heavy and be- 
numbing torpor was succeeded by excruciating agony. 
They laid me in the after-part of the boat. Zela bent over 
me, and tried, with gentle words and soothing attentions, 
to assuage my agony. "Zela!" I said, — u my good 
spirit ! — tell me, was that our evil fate that struck at my 
life ? — was it Azrael, the red angel of death ? — has he 
wounded me mortally ? " 

i( Bis Allah I" she answered, " the good spirit paralysed 
the warrior's arm, when he aimed at your life. God is 
strong, and we are weak. Death strikes the trunk, and 
not the limbs." 

The ball had entered just below my right groin, inclin- 
ing downwards, the prince having been considerably above 
me when he fired. The pain augmented, but the wound 
did not bleed ; and it was not a consolatory reflection at 
the time that we had no surgeon on board. I was hoisted 
on the schooner's deck, carried down into the cabin, and 
laid on the couch. The prince had been so close to me 
that a large portion of the powder had apparently en- 
tered with the ball, and torn and scarified the surrounding- 
flesh, which was black and livid. Zela applied the yolks 
of raw eggs over the wound to draw out the powder ; — 
an Eastern remedy, and certainly effectual. Nothing was 
done after this but washing with hot wine and laying on 
poultices. For four or five days and nights the pain was 
immitigable ; except, which I have always experienced 
with gun-shot wounds, that it was more severe from noon 
till sun-rise ; and no Raypoot ever watched and worshipped 
the first ray of the rising luminary of day so devoutly as 
I did. For twelve days I ate nothing, living, like the 
whale, on suction. What is the strongest impressed on 
my memory is the unparalleled devotion and unwearied 
attention of Zela, w T ho, I really believe, suffered mentally 
more than I did bodily. A friend of our own sex cannot 
d d 3 



406 



ADVENTURES OP 



pass through the ordeal of attendance on a sick couch. 
Friends shrink from the trial ; they will share danger, — 
nay, more, their purses, — they may give their aid, their 
counsel, and their pity ; but they cannot sympathise with 
one in sorrow or sickness. No, it is the woman who 
loves, — she alone can soothe, watch with exhaustless 
affection and patience, endure the waywardness of mind 
and the vexatious absurdity which arise from sickness or 
sorrow. Can the friendship of man, however ardent and 
sincere, be compared with the idolatry with which women 
give up soul and body to the man consecrated by their 
virgin affections ? Friendship is founded on necessity ; it 
must be planted and cultured with care ; it flourishes only 
on particular soils : whilst love is indigenous throughout 
the world. Friendship, like bread, is the staff of our ex- 
istence ; but love is the origin and perpetuator of existence 
itself. Can I think of Zela's care and watchfulness during 
my sufferings, without digressing on the matchless love of 
women ? If there is a portion I would snatch from the 
gloomy abyss of my past life to live over again, it should 
be that month in which I lay wounded, pained, and help- 
less, nursed with far deeper love than that of the fondest 
mother when she watches the symptoms of disease, or re- 
turning health, over her first-born child. 

It should have been remarked, that when we got on 
board, we lost no time in hoisting in the boats and moving 
directly out to sea, keeping a north-east course, anxious 
to hasten our junction with the grab, and to have the ad- 
vantage of Van Scolpvelt's surgical skill. At that time I 
had not learnt, what experience has since convinced me of, 
that, in nine cases out of ten, in gun-shot wounds, a sur- 
geon, however skilful, is of little advantage. The probe 
and plug are discarded ; blood enough to avert inflamma- 
tion generally proceeds from the wound ; a few poultices, 
cleanliness, and bandages are all that nature requires. With 
healthy and un corrupted constitutions, nature must be left 
to use her own inscrutable and wondrous power of healing, 
recruiting, joining, dovetailing, and glueing. As I re- 
covered, I cannot forget the wolf-like greediness with which 
I ravenously preyed on a piece of lamb. No words can 



A YOUNGER SON. 407 

express the relish with which I gnawed and crunched, with 
keen eye and sharp tooth, the very bones. The day after 
Zela brought me the shoulder of a small kid roasted. It 
was at noon, and my imagination had been gloated all the 
morning exclusively on the dinner hour. On its being 
placed before me, I exclaimed, " My God ! is this all ? 
Now I find the loss of poor Louis ! He would not have 
given me the fragment of a starved kid, — he would have 
roasted the entire mother, with the kid as a garnish ! " 

As my appetite returned, my strength was gradually re- 
stored; and, with the dignified addition of crutches, I 
resumed my duty on deck. One of our wounded died, 
certainly not from the effect of his wound, which was but 
a scratch, but from the lingering effects of the drug in the 
coffee, with which he had greedily drenched himself. His 
comrades, for a long time, complained of the Javanese 
poison ; but their disorder, I believe, arose from their 
taking the medicine I had prescribed for the sick, ■ — wine. 
A steady sea-breeze, a moderate temperature, and the me- 
thodical regularity of a sea-life, dispelled fever and dysen- 
tery, and restored my men to health. 

A few words will explain the cause of our receiving the 
timely succour in Java. Zela, with her younger hand- 
maiden, had embarked in a small canoe, fancifully deno- 
minated her barge, and had pulled along the shore to a 
sheltered nook, where she might indulge in her favourite 
recreation of swimming. This had been our diurnal 
habit, and we were almost amphibious. De Ruyter, at 
the Isle of France, used to compare me to a shark, and 
Zela, clothed in striped cotton, to the little blue and white 
pilot-fish, while she was preceding me in the water, or 
floating on the surface. At this time, as she was swim- 
ming, she caught the sound of musketry, borne by the 
land-wind, and conveyed along the sheltered and unbroken 
surface of the sea ; it was distant, low, and indistinct. At 
first she naturally concluded we were at our sport ; but, 
she said, an indefinable presentiment of evil had crept on 
her mind. She dressed herself hurriedly: her first im- 
pulse was to land, and trace the noise to its source ; but 
reflection forbade her following her inclination, and she 



408 ADVENTURES OF 

paddled the canoe along the beach, towards the mouth of 
the river j where she had observed the boats were lying, but 
they were not there. The report of guns then became 
more distinct ; and her exquisite sense of hearing enabled 
her to distinguish the sound of my carbine, by its sharp 
ajnd ringing report. Soon after she faintly distinguished 
the shouts of the natives, which she discovered to be those 
of war, not of hunting. Hastening on board, she told the 
mate her fears. He went up to the mast-head, and there 
caught a glimpse both of the advancing cavalry, and the 
detached parties of Javanese hurrying from the village. 
The boats were luckily alongside, the long-boat having the 
gun in it for the protection of the woodcutters when on 
shore ; they were quickly manned and armed. In spite 
of every remonstrance, Zela peremptorily insisted on ac- 
companying them ; and, by being conversant in savage 
warfare, with unerring sagacity directed the party, which 
otherwise would not have arrived in time ; so that I may 
justly call her the angel of my fate. 



CHAPTER XXII. 

Here the earth's breath is pestilence, and few 
But things whose nature is at war with life — 
Snakes and ill worms — endure its mortal dew. Shelley. 

What with calms and squalls treading on each other's 
heels, pursuing the vessels of all nations which awakened 
the smallest hopeof proving lawful prizes, and flying from 
those for which we were no match, ours was no idle life, 
— nor was it unprofitable. In India I had always seen 
those in power make that power subservient to their in- 
terests and passions ; and thus is it ever with men, unless 
they are muzzled and chained like dogs, as is wisely enacted 
in some parts of Europe. I had acquired these rabid pro- 
pensities, and my power to do wrong was only limited by 
my means. The gulf of Siam and the Chinese seas long 
resounded with the depredations of the schooner ; and the 



A YOUNGER SON. 409 

approach of the horrid hurricanes and water-spouts, so 
prevalent there, were less dreaded than the sight of our 
long, low hull ; yet, like the devil, we were not of quite 
so murky a hue as represented. Having faithfully nar- 
rated, in my previous history, particular instances of our 
acts and manner of life, selected from my private journals, 
I shall add wings to my story, by avoiding henceforth 
minute details, leading to endless repetition, and the me- 
thodical dulness contained in that book of lead, — I mean, 
a ship's log-book. 

We first touched at the island of Caramata for water. 
Our stowage being principally occupied by plunder, leaving 
but a narrow space for water, our avarice was often bitterly 
punished by the severest torture human nature can sustain, 
when we have been severally limited to a daily modicum 
of three half pints, or less, of foul and fermenting water ; 
yet, nauseous as it was, the most avaricious among us 
would have freely exchanged his share of the booty for an 
unlimited draught. My idea then of perfect happiness 
was a plunge in a lake of clear, cold water ; — a river 
seemed too small to satisfy my insatiable thirst. We w T ere 
in this horrible state of drought when we put into Cara- 
mata, where we obtained a plentiful supply of water, fruit, 
and poultry, upon which we renewed our course. 

One of the rendezvous for meeting with the grab was in 
the vicinity of the Philippine Islands. Keeping along the 
north-east coast of Borneo, we boarded a large Chinese 
junk, off two burning islands. One of these islands was 
very small, and shaped like an inverted cone ; the smooth 
edges of the crater were gilded with fire, whence arose a 
steady column of thin vapour, with occasional sparks. This 
seemed to be connected by a shoal, probably formed by the 
lava, to the larger island, which had no fire on its shaggy 
summit, was of the colour and form of a Persian's cap, and, 
from a jagged mouth below its top, thick volumes of black 
smoke were puffed out at intervals. The quarter-master 
said, <e Look at that lubberly, lazy Turk ! what a cool birth 
he has got, squatting in the sea, to smoke his water-pipe !" 
I laughed at the fanciful, and not inapplicable comparison . 
The junk was densely crowded with Chinese, migrating to 



410 ADVENTURES OP 

Borneo as settlers. I bartered some birds'-nests for fresh 
provision s, ducks, hogs, and fruit, and left the living cargo 
unmolested to proceed on their voyage. 

Some nights after this we were dreadfully alarmed at 
grazing on a sand-bank. Luckily, there was little wind, 
and we escaped without any apparent damage ; for, had it 
been blowing weather, we should have been wrecked. We 
made the island of Palawan, and brought up in tolerable 
anchorage off Bookelooyant Point, under the shelter of a 
group of small islands. Here we remained for two days, 
and, seeing nothing of De Ruyter, I got under way, and 
steered a northerly course, till I made our second rendez- 
vous, at an island called the Sea-horse. It was uninhabited; 
and in a certain spot, the situation of which De Ruyter had 
particularly described, after considerable trouble in search- 
ing, I found a letter which he had promised to leave for 
me, with his further instructions, in the event of his not 
meeting me there. By this I was directed to run in a 
parallel line of latitude, therein set down, till I got sight of 
the coast of Cochin China. I acted accordingly. 

Hitherto every thing went on well on board; the 
weather was remarkably clear and fine, with nights so 
shining and delightfully cool, that I generally passed them 
on deck, reading with Zela, or listening to Arab tales. We 
had been some days becalmed off an island called Andra- 
das, to the westward of which we were slowly drifting, 
from an under- current, when we observed indications of 
an approaching change of weather. There was a breathless 
stillness in the atmosphere, which was thick with heavy 
dew: the island became veiled, its outline shadowy and 
indistinct, the sun seemed blood-shot, and its dimensions 
considerably augmented ; it had lost its wonted fire, and 
the eye might gaze on it un dazzled : the stars were visible 
long before their hour ; they appeared nearer to the sea, 
and resembled moons, but lustreless. This dismal and 
melancholy prelude was frightfully reflected in the water, 
and on the dark faces of my native crew. It was with 
difficulty that I aroused them from their torpor, to prepare 
for the battle which it was evident we should soon be com- 
pelled to fight with the wild winds and waves. 



A YOUNGER SON. 411 



CHAPTER XXIII. 

"Whilst above the sunless sky, 

Big with clouds, hangs heavily, 

And behind the tempest fleet 

Hurries on with lightning- feet, 

Riving sail and cord and plank, 

Till the ship has almost drank 

Death from the o'er-brimming deep. Shelley. 

The men aloft were sending down the light masts and 
yards; we on deck were clewing up the sails, and the 
Arabs and natives drowned their fears in noise and bustle. 
I watched eagerly all around the horizon : its grey, misty 
hues were every instant denser and darker. Casting my 
eyes upwards, a ball of fire, which I thought was a shoot- 
ing-star, descended perpendicularly from above us, as we 
lay becalmed and motionless, into the sea, close to our 
quarter, making the same sort of noise in the water as a 
red-hot cannon ball. At the same moment the skies were 
rent asunder with an appalling crash : our vessel shook as 
if she had struck upon a rock : rain, wind, lightning, and 
thunder burst over our heads all together, and the sea was 
lashed up into huge dark billows. The storm, happily, 
took us right aft; and, under bare poles, with wild and 
resistless force, rapid as lightning, it drove us before it. 
Having weathered the first shock, and there being sea- room, 
we soon recovered from our consternation, and the gale 
settled in the north-east. We got the storm-sails up, that 
we might be enabled to bring her to the wind, when the 
first fury of the gale was spent. Ours was a matchless 
sea- boat ; and, having secured every thing snugly on boards 
we carefully luffed her up to the wind, and lay to, with a 
close-reefed fore-storm-staysail. The sky was of a pitchy 
darkness, the sea white with foam. 

I went down in the cabin to see, by the chart, as well as 
under such circumstances it was possible, where we were, 
when I heard a general shout on deck. Wondering what 
it could mean, I jumped up the hatchway, and, speechk ss 
with astonishment, beheld a large ship coming up slap on 



412 ADVENTURES OF 

our weather quarter. She was scudding under bare poles. 
It was evident she had seen us ; and I distinguished the 
face of a man holding a lantern over her how, when we 
were asked, through a speaking trumpet, what we were, 
and then we heard, — ec Schooner, a-hoy ! — strike, or we 
will sink you ! " Instantly all was in commotion on the 
deck of the frigate, for such I made her out to be, getting 
her guns out, and preparing to use them. My surprise 
prevented my replying, and it was not till her long tier of 
heavy cannon swept by us, so near that she actually with 
her main-shrouds grazed our jib boom, and till a voice 
again bellowed out, — " Do you strike ? " — that I gained 
my presence of mind, and, calling out, — Ci Put the helm 
up ! " — we bore away, till I got the wind on my quarter. 
Several guns w r ere fired at us. Our only hope w T as in more 
canvass on the schooner; and as soon as she felt it, and 
found herself released from the restraint under which she 
had laboured, with her head to the sea, groaning and stag- 
gering from the tremendous blows of the waves, she flew 
like a greyhound when let slip at its prey. She dashed 
madly through the crests of the foaming billows, which 
hissed and fumed as if boiling, and left in her w r ake a line 
of sparkling light like a meteor in the heavens, brighter 
from being contrasted with the blackness of the night. 

While congratulating myself on our escape, the man 
looking out on our fore-rigging (for the fore-part of the 
deck was swept clean by every sea) called out, — " The 
frigate a-head ! " We had just time to put the helm up 
again, when we swept by a ship, which I saw, by a dim 
lantern on her poop, was not the fiigate, but a larger 
vessel. We had scarcely cleared her before we crossed the 
bow of another, and then another. I was bewildered. The 
mate said wildly and fearfully, — ( ' These be no real ships, 
sir, — but the e Flying Dutchman ! ' ,; To which the 
quarter-master answered, — " I'll be damned if it be, — 
it be a China fleet/' The truth of this instantly flashed 
across my mind ; — it was the homeward-bound Canton 
fleet. 

When well to leeward of them, we again hauled our 
wind, and lay to, till daylight should appear. After a 



A YOUNGER SON. 413 

dreadful night of anxiety, perplexity, and peril, the dark- 
ness, which I thought had lasted an eternity, slowly disap- 
peared ; and lurid streaks of light, "betokening a tempestuous 
day, barely enabled me to take a survey of the dim and 
narrow circle of the horizon. What a change a single day 
had made ' On the previous morning a child's paper boat 
might have swum securely, and now these English ships of 
colossean size, compared to which we must have appeared 
a nutshell, were madly tossed about. Every wave, like a 
mountain, threatened to overwhelm them. Lashed up by 
the wind, the sea seemed boiling; and the frothy scum, 
formed on its surface, filled the air like a snow-storm. The 
old weather-beaten quarter- master, who had hold of the 
helm, as with his horny hand he wiped off the spray which 
was flying over him, and mingled with the tobacco juice 
down his grisly beard, said, — iC Mayhap old Neptune's 
Mis 'ess wants a cup of tea this morning, and has boiled 
the water, and belike will sarve herself out of those three 
tea-chests. Three ! — ay, — my wife always turned in 
in three spoonsful, — one for 1, one for her, and t'other 
for the pot." 

The three East-Indiamen, which were from twelve to 
fifteen hundred tons, seemed to have suffered considerable 
damage. They were lying to, awaiting, as I conjectured, 
the coming up of their consorts ; for it was evident they 
were part of the convoy I had encountered in the night : 
consequently, concluding I was now both ahead and to lee- 
ward of them all, it was necessary I should get the weather- 
gage before the men-of-war came up, in order to be safe 
from their pursuit when the violence of the storm should 
abate. Accordingly, taking advantage of the lull, which 
generally occurs at break of day, under our storm-sails we 
hauled our wind. I have said a better sea-boat never 
floated than ours : all our light spars were secured on deck, 
the hatchways and ports were battened down, and, being free 
from lumber, and in the best trim, we floated on the wild 
seas in comparative ease as well as security ; whilst the huge 
and unwieldy Indiamen, high out of water, and lumbered 
up within and without, looked like any thing but swans on 
a lake. As the light became stronger, the horizon was 



414' ADVENTURES OF 

enlarged ; the sun, though at times obscured by dark mas- 
ses of rapidly-passing clouds, pierced with its wandering 
beams the vapours hanging over the sea, and I was enabled, 
with a powerful telescope, to count seven other vessels, 
among which the most prominent was a line-of-battle ship, 
distinguished by her broad pennant as the commodore. She 
was making signals, as I apprehended, to the frigate from 
which I had so miraculously escaped — thanks to the gale. 
Sweeping my glass round the horizon to windward, I ob-r 
served the frigate bearing down to the leeward ships, 
seemingly to assist those which had suffered most, the 
weather ships having borne up and congregated to leeward, 
except one solitary bark, whose white and reduced main- 
topsail could alone be distinguished, in the very eye of the 
wind, or, as sailors say, dead to windward. She, too, 
altered her course, but not in the track, of the others, her 
object appearing to be to keep near them, but not to go 
amongst them. I watched her intently: the cut of her 
sails, her taunt masts, the celerity of her manoeuvres, and 
the velocity with which she moved, proved her a ship of 
war, yet every thing denoted she was not English. 

(( Take the glass/' I said to the old quarter-master, " I 
can't make out what the devil craft that is. She is altering 
her course, and coming down on us : we must wear round, 
and show her our stern. Well, what do you make her 
out to be, quarter-master ? 

" Why, sir," replied the old seaman, " did you never 
see in the Indies three fore-and-aft sails such as she car- 
ries ? I larnt that cut when I sarved in a New York 
pilot-boat, and I cut that there canvass, as sartain as my 
name be Bill Thompson ! " 

" What ! " I exclaimed, « is it the grab ? " 

" Sartainly it be," says Bill. 



A YOUNGER SON. 415 



CHAPTER XXIV. 

Blow, swiftly blow, thou keel- compelling gale! 

Till the broad sun withdraws its lessening ray j 

Then must the pennant-bearer slacken sail, 

That lagging barks may make their lazy way. Byron. 

The welcome news spread through the schooner, and joy 
beamed from every eye. In an hour she came up alongside 
of us, when we gave a simultaneous cheer, that arose above 
the noise of the still undiminished gale. My pleasure was 
indescribable, heightened at its being unexpected and op- 
portune. As no boat could live in the sea, we could only 
communicate by our private code of signals, by which I 
was directed to keep close to the grab, and follow her mo- 
tions. 

The gale continued steadily blowing out of the Gulf of 
Siam, drifting the convoy down towards Borneo. We fol- 
lowed De Ruyter, as he edged down on them. I observed 
that most of the merchant-ships had suffered more or less 
damage : one of them had lost her foremast, which, as we 
afterwards were informed, had been struck by lightning, 
when twelve or fourteen men were killed : the commodore 
had her in tow. Another had lost her topmast and jib- 
boom : being a heavy sailer, she was a long way to leeward, 
and the frigate, under much canvass, considering the 
weather, was towing her. The other ships were uniting 
their efforts to keep together, and assist each other : while 
De Ruyter practised successively every nautical expedient 
to harass and divide them, in which, with reckless effron- 
tery, I aided and abetted. Day and, night we hung on 
them, like wolves on a sheep-fold, kept at bay by the watch- 
dogs. Our superiority in sailing gave us the power of 
annoyance ; but, besides the men-of-war, the greater por- 
tion of the merchant-company's ships overmatched us in 
number of men and weight of metal, carrying from thirty 
to forty guns, and from a hundred and fifty to three hun- 
dred men. Nevertheless, we impeded their progress so 
much by day with both feigned and real attacks, and de- 
ceived them so much at night by false signals with guns 



416 



ADVENTURES OF 



and lights, that they made every effort to destroy or get rid 
of us. The frigate gave chase to us alternately ; but though 
she was a strong ship, and was handled in the most masterly 
and seamanlike manner, all her attempts were vain. My 
temerity frequently put the schooner in jeopardy : once, as 
she pursued me, out-carrying me with sail, I should ine- 
vitably have fallen into her hands, if her jib-boom and 
fore-topmast had not gone by the board, as she had opened 
a fire on me from her bow-chasers. Thus we succeeded 
in embarrassing and impeding the convoy, in despite of 
their strenuous and unwearied exertions to keep together, 
we being favoured by the islands, banks, and rocks scat- 
tered on their lee, towards which the continuance of the 
gale, aided by the swell and current, combined to drive 
them. The ship which the frigate had occasionally in tow, 
when deprived of that aid by our keeping her incessantly 
on the alert, had drifted far astern and to leeward. As the 
sun set, De Ruyter was alongside of us, considerably ahead 
of the fleet. He said — 

" In twenty-four hours this gale will have expended its 
strength, not the less violent, in the mean time, on that 
account. To-night we will make our last effort, which 
shall be to cut off that sternmost ship. I will prevent the 
frigate from succouring her till sunset : then she can be of 
no avail. I will come to windward of you. At nightfall, 
do you get in her wake, and you shall find me near you." 

With words to this effect De Ruyter left me ; and, with 
even more than his wonted audacity, ran in among the con- 
voy, undauntedly exchanging shots with several of the 
largest. By the rapidity of his movements he kept the 
frigate continually on the alert. The Indiamen looked like 
Chinese junks ; and, for the most part, were manned with 
those outcast, miserable wretches, Lascars. Such a one 
was the dismasted ship, which De Ruyter and myself, 
having successfully detached her from the convoy, doubted 
not would be our prize. 

England may be justly proud of her gallant seamen, 
hardy, fearless, and weather-beaten as the rocks on her own 
iron-bound coast. The wealth of a single island, paltry 
and insignificant in itself, maintains more effective ships of 
war at sea than all Europe combined. To this, however, 



A YOUNGER SON. 417 

every thing is sacrificed. Yet it is a singular fact that her 
vessels engaged in commerce are, without exception, from 
those employed in the most distant parts to the coasters, 
the most unsightly, dirtiest, and heaviest sailers in the 
world, and, during the war, the worst manned, for then 
the navy impressed all the able seamen. Owing to the in- 
judicious law by which the tonnage duties are levied, from 
the measurement of the length of kelston and breadth of 
beam, not by the tonnage a ship may actually contain, the 
merchant-ship-builder's study is to diminish the weight of 
the duty. This they accomplish by continuing the breadth, 
with little diminution, from the stem to the stern, by pro- 
jecting the upper works, and sinking the hold to the depth 
of the well on the desert ; so that, by the absurd measure- 
ment of our government, a ship, registered at seven hundred 
and fifty tons, frequently carries a thousand or eleven 
hundred tons freight. This absurd system can only be 
equalled by that of the Chinese, which, like other idiotic 
edicts, they defend on the score of antiquity. They mea- 
sure the length from the centre of the fore-mast to the 
centre of the mizen-mast, and the breadth is taken close 
abaft the main-mast ; the length is then multiplied by the 
breadth, and the product, divided by ten, gives the mea- 
surement of the ship. By this method a brig often pays 
more than a ship, and a ship of one hundred tons half as 
much as one of a thousand. Yet the English and the 
Chinese are, in their way, both called wise nations. 



CHAPTER XXV. 

But that sad ship is as a miracle 

Of sudden ruin, for it drives so fast, 

It seems as if it had array d its form 

With the headlong storm. 

It strikes — I almost feel the shock, — 

It stumbles on a jagged rock, — 

Sparkles of blood on the white foam are cast. Shelley. 

A change in the weather was apparent. The small curled 
clouds, which hitherto* had all scudded one way, congre- 

E E 



418 ADVENTURES OF 

gating to windward, where they remained stationary, ar- 
ranged in horizontal lines, till incorporated in the dark and 
rugged bank, as if to supply the laboratory of the tempest 
with fuel, now no longer hurried on to a particular point, 
while their hues and forms were changed, being grey and 
evanescent. Night came on, with occasional showers of 
rain ; and the obscurity was such that I could only at times 
catch a glimpse of the Indiaman, directed to where she lay 
by the signals of distress she made to those who could not 
possibly hear or see her, and, if seen, could not assist her. 
The gale, though broken, blew fiercely in squalls ; and in 
the intervening lulls, when relieved from the pressure of 
the gale on the little canvass it was safe to carry, the sullen 
and tumultuous waves hurled us about, and the water fell 
on our deck with the noise and shock of an avalanche, 
every wave threatening to annihilate us. To add to our 
peril, there were shoals and an extensive range of sunken 
rocks immediately under our lee. 

We saw nothing of the grab till morning. The wea- 
ther was then moderated ; and De Ruyter informed me 
that he feared the Indiaman was wrecked ; that when he 
had last seen her she was bound in by sunken rocks ; that 
he had approached to warn her of her danger, and ad- 
vised her to wear round, and haul her wind, but she had 
borne away before it, not knowing where she was. ff Now," 
said he, " they must all inevitably perish. Ay, they are 
firing guns for aid, but it is too late ! " 

De Ruyter's conjectures, as to her loss, were verified 
with the earliest break of day. The first object my eye 
rested on was the huge wreck of the ship lying along a 
bed of rocks, fixed within its jagged points as in a Cy- 
clopean vice ; while the immense waves, lashed into fury 
by the opposition of the low reef of scattered rocks, assumed 
their wildest and most destructive forms. Some arose like 
pyramids, others came sweeping along in continued columns, 
till, checked by the shoals, their crests flew upwards clear 
and transparent as glass ; then, curling inwards, they 
hissed and rolled on, till, encountered by the reaction of 
the eddying swell from other quarters, they successively 
disappeared in spray and foam. In the very midst of this 



A YOUNGER SON. 419 

horrific whirlpool, with the surf thundering on her, as if 
ejected hy the force of a volcano, the doomed wreck lay 
like a stranded leviathan. 

Not a vestige of the convoy could be descried through 
the dim veil of misty clouds which hung on the verge of 
the horizon. The gale, after drawing round to the east, 
expended its last efforts, and died away at the first ray of 
the sun. We lay pitching and rolling so heavily that our 
masts bent like rattans, the knees and timbers of the 
vessel groaned and shrieked as if torn asunder, and the 
bulkheads and deck opened and closed with the violence 
of the motion. We were already so near the rocks as to 
fill us with dread. To think of succouring the crew of 
the wrecked vessel (should indeed any of them still exist), 
was at that period out of the question. With a telescope 
I could make out that the main-mast with the main-yard, 
and the stump of the mizen-mast, were the only parts of 
the wreck over which the sea did not continually break. 
The fore part of the vessel was bilged, and occasionally 
under water ; so that I knew the decks must have blown 
up, and her cargo been washed out. Her poop was high 
out of the water, but the surf played over it like a foun- 
tain. It was evident, if any of her crew had escaped, 
they must be on the weather main-yard-arm, which was 
topped considerably up, the lee side drooping, and the 
swell striking against it. Had any sought refuge on the 
weather side of the yard, it was barely possible they could 
-maintain their hold against the continued shocks to which 
they were liable. 

At nine a. m. the swell had so far abated that, seeing 
De Ruyter prepare to get a boat out, I followed his exam- 
ple ; and succeeded with a light and particularly buoyant 
whale-boat, with the second mate and four of my best 
seamen — my wound confining me on board. De Ruy- 
ter having spoken my boat, they proceeded together, mak- 
ing a long sweep round the shoals to leeward, as I 
readily conjectured, to make the desperate attempt at ap- 
proaching the Wreck ; — the gallant De Ruyter, the first 
of seamen, and the first in danger, whether to save or 
slay ! — while I, impotent as a bed-ridden hag, could only 



420 ADVENTURES OF 

curse the paralysed limb which withheld me from follow- 
ing his noble example. 

It was past noon ere I observed the two boats returning 
round the reef towards the grab. I had been able to dis- 
tinguish men moving on the main-yard of the wreck, and 
that the boats had succeeded in getting near enough to 
induce them to lower themselves by ropes into the 
sea. Some, I concluded, were saved. The schooner being 
the lighter vessel, I got her nearer to the boats ; and 
the swell continuing to go down, they reached us in safety. 
De Ruyter swung himself on board with a rope; and, 
as he wrung my hand, his face beamed with joy brighter 
than I had ever beheld it. "Had that lubberly ship," said he, 
" kept clear of the rocks, she would have been ours, and I 
should have cleared forty thousand dollars ; yet, I know 
not why, the rescuing four of her people gives me greater 
pleasure than if I had made a prize of her, or of tea-chests 
piled high as the Himmalayan mountains. Poor fellows ! 
they must be endued with the hardness of otters to have 
lived through such a night, on such a perch. Hoist them 
on board, my lads ! — but first the father and his son." 

The words were scarcely uttered when a man, with a 
rent jacket of red camlet and yellow facings, embroidered 
with silver cord, and the other parts of his dress stained 
and dripping, came feebly staggering towards me, evidently 
unable to support himself. A dark stripling, naked to the 
waist, of a light and muscular form, held him up by the 
arm. The former was between forty and fifty years of 
age, a captain in a Bengal regiment, returning to Europe, 
on leave, after five and twenty years' service in India ; by 
which he had acquired a right to full pay for the remainl 
der of his life, amounting to a hundred and eighty pounds 
per annum. This beggarly stipend, had his habits or the 
climate been more temperate, he might have lived many 
years to claim ; but, incarcerated in the oven-like atmo- 
sphere of Calcutta, his liver had enlarged to the same un- 
natural proportion as that of a Strasburg goose, and by the 
same means, — heat and stuffing. Bile, not blood, seemed 
to circulate, or rather to be stagnated, throughout his body, 
dyeing his skin with the slimy green and yellow hue en- 



A YOUNGER SON. 421 

crusting standing water. His annuity was not worth half 
a year's purchase. The boy was from sixteen to seven- 
teen, his son by a native woman. Grafted on an indige- 
nous stock, he had grown well, and gave promise of goodly 
fruit. These and other particulars I learnt afterwards, 
for instantly on their arrival on board I gave them a 
separate cabin, and had all their wants supplied. Of the 
other two men saved, one was the third mate — a square, 
athletic north-countryman, inured to wreck and storm, 
having been brought up in a collier on his own dangerous 
coast. The other was the serang, or native boatswain ; 
he was the finest looking fellow I ever saw, as good a 
seaman as he was a brave man — the more remarkable 
from his caste being stigmatised for dastardly conduct. 
The gallant youth, who had preserved his father through 
all the dangers I have described, these men spoke of with 
wonder and admiration. 



CHAPTER XXVI. 



Then rose from sea to sky the wild farewell ; 

Then shriek'd the timid, and stood still the brave ; 

Then some leap'd overboard with dreadful yell, 

As eager to anticipate their grave ; 

And the sea yawned around her like a hell. Byron. 

When refreshed by sleep and food, the third mate told his 
story of the wreck. His ship, one of the largest, had lost 
her topmasts, and was otherwise greatly damaged by being 
taken aback, when first struck by the gale. The frigate 
had occasionally taken her in tow. She was a very heavy 
sailer, hardly seaworthy. Her cargo consisted of tea, 
silk, and sundries. With women, children, black servants, 
and others, there were above three hundred souls in her. In 
the early part of the night she laboured so much from the 
heavy swell as to become generally leaky ; many of the 
chain-bolts were drawn, and the chain-plates gave way. 

E E 3 



422 ADVENTURES OF 

In bearing up to ease her, two of the guns of the main- 
deck had broken loose ; one of them had stove in a port- 
hole, which let in the water ; upon this the pumps became 
choked from the tea getting into the well. When the grab 
had hailed her, and told her of the rocks, she had attempted 
to wear round, but, for want of head-sail, became un- 
governable. Ultimately the wind, swell, and indraught 
drifted her bodily towards, and then by force through, a 
narrow channel of the reefs. There, brought up stern- 
foremost on a sunken ledge of rocks, in the very midst of 
the breakers, all the Lascars instantly betook themselves to 
the rigging and masts. The wailing and screaming were 
so loud as to drown the uproar of the winds and waves. 
The spray, sometimes the waves, covered the ship ; all 
thought they were already under water ; most of those on 
the decks were so bewildered that they were washed over- 
board, before they could take any measures to save them- 
selves. Nothing was visible but the white foam bubbling 
all around. They were entirely ignorant of where they 
were, or what they were to do. " At that moment," con- 
tinued the third mate, u I knew not a single person on 
board. I swung myself into the main-rigging by a rope ; 
many Lascars and some of the officers were there. I went 
on the main-top ; that also was crowded ; none could be 
heard to speak, from the spray which even reached them 
there. Soon after I saw the foremast go by the board ; — 
from the noise on it I thought it was covered with men ; — 
they were all lost ! Hardly did I know the deck of my 
own ship ; her forecastle seemed entirely under water. I 
heard a crash ; I thought it was the sea working its way 
between decks, having entered by the hatchways. By a 
loud report, like thunder, I knew the decks were blown up, 
and the ship water-logged. Some time afterwards, towards 
morning, she made a sudden lurch, and fell on her beam- 
ends to port ; — the shock was so sudden and violent that 
it carried away the mizen mast, on which was the greater 
part of the Europeans ; and it threw most of the men out 
of the main-top, and the lee main-yard arm ; — being in the 
water, all were swept from it ! I and the serang, who had 
held fast, seeing the top was going to pieces, no longer 



A YOUNGER SON. 423 

tenable, crawled out on the weather main-yard, which we 
found almost abandoned ; for the braces, which steadied 
it, being carried away, and the mainsail, having got loose, 
had shaken off those which were on it; yet, though the 
sail was blown away, the yard w r as swinging about see-saw 
fashion. J then first came athwart the old captain, cling- 
ing like a lobster to a rock, with the young half-caste stick- 
ing fast as a barnacle alongside him, both of them lashed 
on the yard by the gaskins, which the lubbers had cast 
loose for that purpose, not knowing the sail would get 
adrift, which had caused so much mischief. Daylight 
appeared, when I could only count six alive. We were 
almost exhausted, and without hope, till we saw your 
boats : but when we looked round, we thought it impossible 
that any one could near us ; for we were shut in by 
breakers, on which the sea burst so violently that we could 
scarcely hear each other's voices. Besides, we knew you 
were French privateers; and when we did observe the 
boats shove off, pulling towards us, we thought they came 
to see what plunder they could pick up, not to save us." 
Here the mate's hard north- country visage brightened, and 
his small blue eye glistened from under his high cheek- 
bones. " I have seen many brave and good boatmen come 
off in life-boats, and other shore-boats, on our coast, in 
gales when no ship could show a rag of canvass, but no 
man ever saw such a devil's bay as we lay in. The eddy- 
ing swell whirling round and round, flying up like water- 
spouts, dead men, tea-chests, casks, bales of silk and cotton, 
ship- sails, spare boats and oars, men's hammocks, chests, 
were all tossed topsy-turvy about together. It made me, 
sir, very queer to look at it ; for they all seemed alive, and 
the men moved their arms and legs about as if they were 
drunk. There was in particular an old black nurse hold- 
ing a white child in her arms, which she seemed trying to 
re-ship on board us, and then she spun round and round the 
rocks ; and I thought I heard the body squealing, every 
time they were dashed against the rocks. A man near me 
on the yard never took his eyes off her ; and all at once, 
he called out, as if he were stark mad, — " Ay, ay, old 
devil, I am coming ! I am coming !" — and dashed head- 
e e 4 



424 ADVENTURES OF 

foremost amongst 'em ; he didn't strike out a stroke, but 
went down like lead. The old captain told me not to look 
below ; and I did feel my head going round, as if I were 
top-heavy. A fish or a cork could not float steadily for an 
instant in that roaring whirlpool, and yet the American 
captain got near enough, after a number of trials, to throw 
a lead line on board, when the first man who tried to get 
hold of it was washed off and drowned. Then it was again 
thrown, and that young lad, the officer's son, who was as 
active as a monkey, got hold of it, and I secured the end 
of a rope to it, which the captain hauled on board. One 
by one we lowered ourselves down, and were hauled into 
the boat; and, thank God! though you don't carry En- 
glish colours, there are some of my countrymen on board, 
— and that 's all I care for. And I must say, though this 
be a Yankee, I never saw better craft, or better seamen, or 
kinder to brother tars in distress." 

In the English accounts of this loss it was stated, and 
never contradicted, that, in a dismasted and leaky state, 
she had been seen in the dusk of the evening, bearing 
away, and firing guns of distress. That the men of war, 
convoying the fleet, could not assist her, as the commodore 
had already a ship in tow, which, but for his aid, must 
have been wrecked, being completely dismasted ; and the 
frigate was engaged in keeping off two fast- sailing French 
privateers, which had been hanging on the convoy during 
the heaviest gale the oldest seaman had ever witnessed in the 
China seas; and that the ship missing was supposed to 
have foundered, or been wrecked on the sunken rocks and 
sand banks, which bind the north-east coast of the island 
of Borneo. 

National pride, like the pride of individuals, requires to 
be well oiled in order to work smoothly ; and John Bull, 
with all his vaunted plainness and honesty, is, in reality, 
as vain and gullible as the strutting gander after it is stuffed 
with oil- cake. His dignity would have been compromised 
at any allusion to the East Indiaman's having been cut off 
from her convoy, guarded by his omnipotent and invincible 
ships of war, by a couple of French Lettres de marque, 
and during a tremendous gale, when British tars flatter 



A. YOUNGER SON. 425 

themselves that they alone have the hardihood at once to 
contend against its fury, and to act offensively against an 
enemy. 



CHAPTER XXVII. 

Trust not for freedom to the Franks — 

They have a king who buys and sells. 

In native swords and native ranks, 

The onlv hope of courage dwells ; 

But Turkish force and Latin fraud 

Would break your shield, however broad. Byron. 

So from that cry over the boundless hills, 

Sudden was caught one universal sound, 

Like a volcano's voice, whose thunder fills 

Remotest skies. Shelley. 

As soon as the weather permitted, we steered a north-east 
course, till we made those small islands off the coast of 
Borneo, where we had anchored on a former occasion. 
Here we brought up, repaired our damage, landed our sick, 
and refreshed ourselves. 

I had given De Ruyter an account of every thing I had 
seen, heard, or done. He was much moved at the account 
of Louis's death; for Louis, though with an exterior as 
rough and hard as that of the cocoa-nut, had the genuine 
stamp of worth, not to be forged or effaced ; and he pos- 
sessed as many good qualities as he was generally useful. 
e< I do not know," said De Ruyter, " how we shall manage 
without him. He has long had entire control over our 
money affairs, — an admirable accountant; and to find an- 
other honest man, that is so, to fill his place, will be dif- 
ficult. There is contagion in the handling of money, and 
in the knowledge of the science of numbers, which gives 
too great a facility in the subtracting from others to add 
to ourselves. It makes the mind sordid ; the rapacity of 
money-mongers, commissaries, and pursers is proverbial. 
We must therefore, despairing to fill his place by any other, 
share his duty between us/' 



426 



ADVENTURES OF 



After attentively listening to my affair with the Javanese, 
he exclaimed, — " So, you went a wild goose, or a boar 
chase, excited, I suppose, by its perilous absurdity ! It is 
true, no one could have extricated himself with greater 
judgment ; but who else would have been guilty of such 
folly ? You are as rash and headstrong as our Malay 
friend, the hero of Sambas." 

" By the by, De Ruyter," I replied, " your alliance with 
that predatory tribe of Malays appears to me as gratuitous 
an act of unknightly errantry as my Quixotic expedition 
at Java/' 

He rubbed his hands with glee, his eye brightened, and 
on his dark and manly features was legibly traced the satis- 
faction swelling at his heart. His lips curled, and his 
breast dilated, as he said, — " No, my lad; — to harass, 
burn, sink, and destroy their enemies is a duty I ow r e to 
the flag I sail under. I confess I should not so gladly en- 
gage in these profitless expeditions, but that I loathe and 
detest the English merchant Company, — and all com- 
panies, for tbey are bound together by narrow views and 
selfish ties. Revenge, or rather retribution, is to me what 
the Sultan of Borneo says of that matchless diamond he 
possesses, — like the sun, above all price. A parson poet 
of yours exclaims, 

* What is revenge, but courage to call in 
Our honour's debts ? ' 

■ — and debts of honour, you know, must be scrupulously 
paid. I think, for every dollar they once took from me, 
they have subsequently lost, and by my means, as many thou- 
sands. The Company had long sought to obtain a secure 
footing on that side of Borneo ; but tbe almost total w r ant 
of harbours, and the opposition every where met with from 
the noble and chivalrous Malays, continued to frustrate 
their attempts. At last they fixed their greedy eyes on 
the town of Sambas, which has a river, good anchorage, 
not very distant, and is defended by a fort, besides being 
situated in the best part of the island for commerce and 
culture. Perfidious in design as atrocious in act, they 
gave out that the purpose of their expedition was exclu- 



A YOUNGER SON. 427 

sively to destroy that piratical settlement ; when the fact 
was, they had determined to settle there themselves, and 
lay the foundation-stone of their old system, by which 
they first take all the produce and trade of the country, 
and then the country itself. 

e< The grab being in a secure berth, and our heroic 
Malay chieftain having pledged himself and people to be 
under my guidance, I, after completing the necessary ar- 
rangements, directed him to embark his followers in their 
war-proas, when, with a strong party in my boats, we pro- 
ceeded together along the coast, till we arrived at Tangong 
point, where we disembarked, and where I left my boats. 
We then marched over land ; the heavy guns and other 
bulky articles being sent round in the proas. After a very 
long and distressing journey through forests, over rugged 
and gigantic mountains, across pathless and almost endless 
plains, rivers, torrents, and morasses, we came to the 
banks of the river of Sambas. On one side was a swamp, 
and on the other an inextricable and interminable jungle. 
Through intricate paths, guided by the natives, we at last 
arrived at the town of Sambas, marked out for destruction 
by the English. Its inhabitants were huddled together in 
many miserable rattan huts, under cover of a shapeless 
mass of mud and timber, dignified with the appellation of 
tower, or fort. Here and there were scattered basket-like 
habitations, supported, as you are, on crutches, and ap- 
parently ready to move to the town, when tempted by 
business or necessity. Journeying along, I had observed a 
very capacious, a magnificent bay, shut in by islands, to the 
eastward of the Malay town, in which, it was evident, the 
invaders would anchor their vessels, and disembark their 
troops. I likewise found the native inhabitants were 
moving their goods, chattels, and war-boats to recesses and 
fastnesses, prepared to avoid, as it looked, rather than op- 
pose, the threatened invasion of which I had given them 
notice. At my instigation the chieftain went with his 
people into the jungle and morasses,, ascended to the moun- 
tain caverns, to harangue the grey-bearded leaders of the 
private coast, and rally together. At the sound of battle 
and plunder, the hidden warriors started out like packs of 



428 ADVENTURES OF 

jackals from their retreats ; the enterprising spirit of the 
chieftain inspired every heart, and spread like fire up a 
mountain in the dry season. Detestation of the Europeans, 
and emulation of each other, conspired to multiply their 
numbers, and collect them together. On the second day, 
while I was putting the fortress into a defensible state, and 
sinking trees to obstruct the passage of the river, I was 
startled at the wild war-cry of thousands of these noblest 
of barbarians. They came pouring down the mountain 
like a deluge, and I was well pleased to be in possession of 
the mud-fortress during the first paroxysm of their inflam- 
matory fever. The violence of their gestures, their pierc- 
ing shrieks, the discharging of their firearms, the shaking 
and clashing of swords and spears, the blasts of their conch- 
shell trumpets reverberating from rock and ravine, — it 
seemed as if all the natives of that savage land were run- 
ning a-muck. My friend, the chieftain, soon came to me, 
accompanied by the most potent leaders of the various 
tribes. To these he made me known ; and, after the pre- 
lude of a plentiful but not a splendid feast, we proceeded 
to business. The chieftain, who was a great orator, made 
a long harangue, in which he magnified my services, and 
concluded with proposing me as their general director, 
being best acquainted with European warfare. I separated 
the respective tribes, and allotted them particular stations, 
where they were to lie concealed till the enemy had entered 
the river, and landed the troops. Then they were to be 
permitted to advance a certain distance, on which a large 
body of Malays, by showing themselves on the side of the 
jungle, should compel them to keep on that side leading to 
the marshes. When arrived there, they were to be op- 
posed by the natives of the town, who were the best ac- 
quainted with its localities. But you may see, in my 
journal, a map of the place, and a plan of its defence, 
which was only partially acted on, their sanguinary im- 
petuosity breaking frantically through every restraint. 

" When every thing was prepared, we waited the arrival 
of the flotilla from Bombay. We had placed look-outs all 
along the coast, and sent fast-sailing proas into the offing. 
It was so long ere they came, and, when we had sight 



A YOUNGER SON. 42$ 

of them, they were so tardy in their movements, that we 
well nigh despaired of slaking our unquenchable thirst for 
vengeance. The soil of India has been crimsoned with the 
blood of her children ; her sultans, her princes, and her 
warrior chieftains have been exterminated. India has been 
subverted by the adventurers of Europe, in their search for 
gold. To pay off the accumulated arrears of blood, by 
exacting life for life, is as impossible as to pay off the 
debt of bankrupt Europe. However, they talk of liquid- 
ating that; and India may yet exact a fraction, in the way 
of dividend, for the myriads of lives so wantonly expended 
by her prodigal Christian invaders. Would that I might 
live to behold the eastern ocean red with blood, as was 
the paltry stream of Sambas, on the day we broke through 
the marshalled ranks of the Christians, when the fierce 
and ungovernable Malays breasted the renegade Sepoys' 
bayonets, with irresistible fury drove them from the muddy 
banks of the river into its dark waters, and left an ample 
feast for its swarms of alligators and dog-fish, and for the 
jackals and vultures on shore ! No quarter was given ; 
little plunder acquired. We pursued the fugitives, de- 
stroying them as they endeavoured to regain their vessels. 
Some boats from their shipping were still landing stores, 
guns, and a few remaining troops ; which, by making a 
stand, facilitated their escape. Yet the slain far outnum- 
bered the rescued, — at least of those who landed. But 
stop, — I hear our Malay chieftain coming alongside. Let 
us go up and welcome him." 

The Malays from their proa were soon on board of us. 
The chieftain rushed towards De Ruyter, knelt and kissed 
his hand, and then placed it on his heart and head. After- 
wards he made a speech, with a voice and action not 
studied from the school of Demosthenes, but of such vio- 
lence that the limbs and muscles of his native auditory were 
set in motion as if by the power of galvanism ; which 
proved that passionate and untaught eloquence can move 
the heart of man, as much as, or perhaps more than, ever 
did the learned and commanding diction of that time- 
serving, subtle Greek philosopher. The purport of his 
speech was to reiterate their thanks for the repeated ser- 



430 ' ADVENTURES OF 

vices De Ruyter had rendered to their nation, and to ex- 
press their admiration of him, his courage, and his wisdom ; 
— his words were, " greater than a lion in fight, and in 
wisdom a prophet." They conjured him to stay with 
them as their prince. They would build him a house on 
the gold mountain, at the foot of which runs the river of 
diamonds ; — this was no oratorical flourish, for a great 
quantity of gold is yearly dug from the mountain, and 
very fine diamonds are fished from the river. They would 
give him all they had, and he should be their father. 
They only besought of him one small boon ; which was, 
that he would use his influence with the great warriors of 
his nation, to go to the little island of great ships (meaning 
England), and, while the ships were in its ports, awaiting 
the monsoon to blow over, that he and his warriors should 
then burn all the ships, lay waste the island, and drown 
all the people. u Thy son," (meaning me,) continued the 
chieftain, " can stay with us, whilst thou dost go and do 
this. Every old man shall be his father, and thy voice 
shall be heard and obeyed through him. For is he not of 
thy blood?" 

De Ruyter perceiving me smile, said, " Well, who 
knows ? Wilder words than these have been spoken ere 
now, and scoffed at ; yet, in after-ages, they have been 
called prophecies, when proved, or believed in, — no matter 
which." 

During our greetings and conversation, a feast had been 
prepared, of which the chieftain partook, and then told De 
Ruyter that every sort of provision should be sent down to 
him on the ensuing day, and his wishes complied with, 
whatever they might be. He concluded with, — " Thou 
lovest my people, for thou hast done more than their 
fathers and mothers for them ; — they gave them life, but 
thou hast given them freedom. But my people are poor, 
and like presents ; I have, however, told them, if any ac- 
cept the smallest trifle from thy people, I will — " (and 
here he glanced fiercely round his own men) — " kill him, 
even though we had both come from the same womb, and 
been suckled by the same bosom." They then descended 
into their proa, and went on shore. 



A YOUNGER SON. 431 



CHAPTER XXVIII. 

The world is full of woodmen, who expel 

Love's gentle dryads from the trees of life, 

And vex the nightingales in every dell, 

With harsh, rude voices, and unseemly strife. Shelley. 

Impatient of confinement, and anxious to see my old 
friends in the grab, I went on board of her, accompanied 
by my little nurse, Zela,, and De Ruyter, who loved her 
as his child. There we passed a jovial night, supping 
and carousing till daylight under the awning, while the 
grab's crew danced and sung ; for, with permission, I had 
brought them a barrel of Java arrac, which is the best in 
India. 

I must not forget Van Scolpvelt, whom I found nearly 
the same as when I left him. My first sight of him was 
through the skylight into his pigeon-house- looking dis- 
pensary. Near the chinks and crevices of the beams were 
several long centipedes crawling about ; and all the cock- 
roaches in the ship sought refuge there. Van cared not for 
them, provided they did not, which cockroaches are liable 
to do when hard pushed for water, creep into his mouth 
as he slept. He was perfectly indifferent to their dropping 
into his soup, or his tea ; perhaps, indeed, he took the 
same pleasure in seeing them scalded to death as did 
Domitian in viewing the struggles of the flies, which, for 
pastime, he cast into spiders' webs. There sat Van, smok- 
ing his meersham, and lugging by its hairy leg a particular 
fine large cockroach out of his teacup. The tea not being 
hot, the huge beetle was no more than refreshed by its 
warm bath. Van, either struck by its extraordinary size, 
or merely to wile away the time, after holding it up to the 
light, spitted it scientifically, and began to scrutinise it 
through a magnifying glass. I was now about to hail 
him, but De Ruyter put his hand on my mouth. After 
Van had satisfied his curiosity, he threw the insect out of 
the scuttle, and sipped his beverage. His anatomical pro- 



432 ADVENTURES OF 

pensities being thus awakened, I saw him fix his eye on 
the beam, then with a sudden dash of his long skinny 
thumb, and with a pressure which proved him to be no 
tyro in the art, he pinned the head of a centipede firmly 
against the timber, the body being concealed in a rent. 
The thumb-screw pressure prevented the reptile from using 
its venom ; and the long writhing body, with its hundred 
quivering legs, fell into the open palm of Van, who forth- 
with projecting his fore-finger, so as to form a natural 
forceps, clutched the crushed head. It was the longest 
and largest I had ever seen. Van, after an alternative 
examination, put it into a bottle, which contained many 
more preserved in spirits, where it long writhed about; 
for it is curious that a centipede, even in that state, will 
continue wriggling for hours. 

De Ruyter now hailed the doctor, who replenished his 
pipe, put his jacket on, and shuffled up the hatchway. 
He held out his defiled fin, which, notwithstanding the 
venom on it, I shook heartily. He then inquired into the 
particulars of my sick list, and devoured my discourse as 
I narrated the ravages of the Java fever. As he heard of 
the death of poor Louis, he expressed great sorrow, apo- 
strophising, however, on his obduracy with regard to me- 
dicine, and eagerly demanded if he had not, during his 
sufferings, called on his name. To this I answered, 
« No." 

' c No ! n echoed Scolpvelt ; ic then he died an impious 
unbeliever ! I alone could have saved him ! " 

When I recounted the death of one of my Arabs from 
poison, he asked if there was nothing else the matter with 
him. I mentioned he had been slightly wounded ; and, 
upon his desiring to be informed of the appearance of the 
wound, I told him the fellow complained it was painful, 
and it looked reddish. 

" What I" said he, " was it a phagedenic sloughing 
sore ? — or do you mean an erysipelatous inflammation ? 
Were not the chylopoietic viscera disordered ? What did 
you apply ? " 

iC Apply, Van ? — why, I told the fellow to drink con- 
gee-water with lemon in it, and to wash his leg with 



A YOUNGER SON. 4:33 

brandy ; but he washed his gullet with the brandy., and 
the sore with the lemon drink." 

" Did he ? — then he proved he knew more of medicine 
than you did. That fellow should have lived, and vou 
died!" 

Scolpvelt vehemently cursed the surgeon who had de- 
serted his post during the battle with an enemy against 
whom, for the benefit of science, he should have gloried 
in contending. He then insisted on examining my wound, 
and observed that, from its appearance, surgeons in general 
woidd believe some portion of my garments had entered 
with the ball, and would prevent the cicatrisation by forcing 
a probe to sound the passage of the ball. " Now," he 
said, " I know, from a long series of practical experience, 
which few like me have had, in gun-shot wounds, that, 
whatever clothing may be shot through, the bail enters the 
flesh without ever conveying a fibre of it into the wound ; 
unless, indeed, it is a ball almost spent, which can con- 
sequently but inflict a superficial wound." 

He wound up his discourse by telling me he saw de- 
cided symptoms of jaundice in my eyes and skin. 

My old quarter-master, standing by me open-mouthed 
with astonishment at the puzzling scientific language, from 
time to time drawled out, " I wonder what rate that ship 
may be he is launching now !" — " Thirty years in the 
navy, and never heard of the Hajademee and the Chylo- 
pottic ! — I suppose they be first-raters, Dutch." — " The 
Cockatrice sloop-of-war I have heard of." 

At last Van turned round with — 

" What is the old dog mumbling, eh ? — he is rotting 
with the scurvy — look here !" — -at which he applied his 
hard thumb to the seaman's red and hairy arm : then 
pressing on it, he removed his claw, and pointed to the 
place. 

" Look \" said he, " the indented stamp remains — the 
collapsed muscles have lost their power and elasticity, from 
the transudation of the blood in the veins." 

The quarter-master, without noticing the impression on 
his wiry arm, perhaps because it had no more sensibility 
than my crutch, said, — 



434 ADVENTURES OF 

c< Collapse — why he means the Colossus seventy-four, 
or the Cyclops. As to Ticity and Ansudation, I suppose 
they too he Dutch craft." 

Van toddled off to see what citric-acid he couid spare 
saying he should visit the schooner's sick in the morning. 



CHAPTER XXIX. 



I love all waste 
And solitary places : where we taste 
The pleasure of believing what we see 
Is boundless, as we wish our souls to be. Shelley. 

The hard features of the old Rais relaxed as he greeted 
me ; and Zela, who loved him for his former kindness, 
kissed his hand, and, sitting down hy him, talked of their 
country and their tribes. On this topic alone the old 
Arab was loquacious. They continued, with little inter- 
mission, in animated discussion on the matchless beauties 
of their native countries, till the grey light of morning 
shone on his dusky form, and illuminated Zela's pallid 
brow. She dwelt on the magnificence of the town and 
river of Yedana, its dark mountains, bright waters, and 
perpetual verdure ; the cool breezes from the Persian gulf, 
and the blue islands of Sohar, of one of which her father 
bad been Schaich. The Rais admitted all this, but warmly 
protested against their being compared to the riches of 
Kalat, or the splendour of Rasalhad ; then the summits of 
the Tor mountains touched heaven, and the desert, where 
he spent his youth, was large as the sea, — but unfortu- 
nately there the similarity ended, for it had not a drop of 
water within its vast circumference. He endeavoured to 
convince Zela what a paradise was this desert, without 
water or wells, and how peacefully and patriarchally they 
lived by supplying themselves from the caravans, and 
exacting tribute from all that passed the inhospitable ocean - 
bed of sand. By some queries from her he was, indeed, 



A YOUNGER SON. 43j> 

compelled to admit the horrid tortures they sometimes 
suffered from the want of water ; that, it was true, hy the 
parched and shrivelled corpses of perished travellers they 
used to trace the caravans, which more than compensated 
them for what they endured : — God knew what was best 
for his children ! As he was fondly dwelling on these 
horrors, I capsized a bucket of water, in which we had 
cooled our claret, over his head, took Zela by the hand, 
got into the boat, and returned aboard. 

Soon after, the schooner was surrounded by country 
boats, laden with live stock, fish, fruit, and vegetables, 
enough to have provisioned a frigate. At the same time 
the four persons whom De Ruyter had redeemed from the 
wreck, went on board the grab, where there was better 
accommodation ; he promising to embrace the first oppor- 
tunity of shipping them to the English settlements. The 
bilious captain of the Bengal army continued to suffer 
from the hardships he had endured during the wreck of 
his ship. While I think of it, I will conclude their his- 
tory. We shortly after shipped them for Bombay in a 
prize we had made, plundered, and liberated. The cap- 
tain and his son took their passage for England. De 
Ruyter and myself, unknown to the father, had insinuated 
a purse of gold mores into a trunk of necessaries which 
they had been compelled, in their utter destitution of 
clothing, to accept. Either at the Cape of Good Hope, or 
at St. Helena, the father died, and thereby relieved the 
Company from the burthen of his annuity. Of the youth, 
a lad of noble feelings, and an incomparable son, I never 
could gain the slightest intelligence ; though I fulfilled my 
promise, made to his father at parting, of doing my ut- 
most to find him out and serve him. Neither did the 
mate return to England; for, as I heard, he had a com- 
mand in the country coasting trade, and, probably, the 
serang continued with him. 

During our stay here we hove the schooner down, to 
examine if she had sustained any damage by striking on 
the sand-bank. There was nothing the matter with her, 
except that a few sheets of copper were rubbed off. We 
then put our vessels into their best sailing trim, completed 

F F 2 



436 



ADVENTURES OP 



our water, cut some spare spars, and painted both the 
hulls. The grab was again metamorphosed into a clumsy, 
country-looking Arab, with a raised poop and forecastle of 
painted canvas. The schooner resumed her original Yan- 
kee cut, with broad streaks of bright yellow rosin. 

De Ruyter made several excursions into the interior, 
under the guidance of the Malay chieftain, being anxious 
to explore a country then totally unknown to Europeans. 
I paddled about the coast and the islands with Zela in her 
canoe. We revisited our old haunts ; and, after having 
designed the plan of a bungalow, I marked out a garden, 
calculated the labour of clearing land enough to yield us 
corn, rice, and wine, and most methodically made in my 
mind every necessary arrangement for establishing a co- 
lony, far surpassing Paradise in purity and bliss, in which 
we, the happy founders, were to pass the rest of our days 
in unruffled tranquillity. Meanwhile with our own hands 
we had erected a hut, consisting of four upright bamboos, 
thatched with palm leaves ; and one day, as Zela was, 
with matchless culinary skill, roasting fish over the live 
embers, the iron ramrod of my carbine serving as a spit, 
I, elated at my newly acquired importance as householder, 
and freeholder of land sans limit, stalked over my domain, 
and said, — 

i£ Sweet Zela, under our own wild vine and fig-tree, 
how much happier we shall be than sweltering in that 
coffin-like schooner, jammed together, and pitching and 
tossing, like packed dates on the back of a lame dromedary ! 
How happy " 

Here I was interrupted by the pushing aside of the 
thick foliage. Hearing some one advance, I began to 
imagine that the resurrection of my old friend the organ 
from the dead was appearing to dispute my title-deeds to 
his property; for it was on the ruins of his former dwelling 
that I had erected mine, which, I must lionestly confess, 
in architectural design, as well as solidity of structure, was 
far inferior to his. But, instead of the orang's apparition, 
it was De Ruyter, laughing as if his heart would burst, 
who thus, for the second time, disturbed my imaginary 
rural plans, calling out, " Come along, my lad ! The 



A YOUNGER SON. 437 

Malay has sent me word that, from their look-out station 
on the mountain, there is a strange sail in the offing to the 
north. Come along, — get on board the lame dromedary 
— ha ! ha ! ha ! The grab is not quite ready for sea. If 
you once get sight of the stranger, she cannot escape ; and 
if detainable, which she must be, bring her in here/' 

In ten minutes I was on board ; in five more I was 
under weigh. With a press of canvass, and with a favour- 
able breeze, we made a clear offing, and, before sunset, 
were in sight of the stranger. She sailed remarkably well. 
We lost her during the night, but luckily there was little 
wind. We regained sight of her next morning ; and, a 
breeze coming out of the gulf, we brought her to, after a 
hard chase of nine hours. She proved to be a country 
trader from Bombay, bound to China. Having heard that 
a French cruiser was off the Cochin-China coast, she had, 
with extreme precaution, kept along the opposite one of 
Borneo, and thus fell into our hands. She was a beautiful 
copper-fastened brig, built of Malabar teak by the Parsees 
of Bombay, freighted with cotton-wool, a few cases of 
opium, guns, pearls from Arabia, sharks' fins, birds' nests, 
and oil from the Lackadive islands, with four or five sacks 
of rupees. This valuable prize consoled us for the failure 
of our plans on the China fleet, and created general satis- 
faction amongst the men. 

We returned to our anchorage elated with success. A 
day or two after De Ruyter despatched his Malay friend 
to Pontiana, a large and wealthy province on the western 
coast, not long founded by a powerful and wise Arab 
prince. The capital is situated on the banks of a wide 
navigable river ; there was a branch of the Dutch factory, 
with which our Malay had extensive dealings. Thither 
he went for an agent, that we might dispose of the Bom- 
bay cargo, as it was adapted for that market ; for we could 
not spare hands to send the prize to a distance. We did 
not well know how to dispose of the vessel. Her captain, 
who was part owner of her, as well as being interested in 
the cargo, was so fond of her, that he proposed to ransom 
the hull. While all this was arranging, I rejoiced in the 
f p 3 



438 



ADVENTURES OP 



delay, as It enabled me to continue my building and idling 
on shore with Zela. 



CHAPTER XXX. 

And I 

Plied him cup after cup, until the drink 

Had warmed his entrails, and he sang aloud, 

In concert with my wailing fellow- seam en, 

A hideous discord. Shelley. — Translation. 

Ha ! ha ! ha! I 'm full of wine, 

Heavy with the joy divine, 

With the young feast oversated : 

Like a merchant vessel freighted 

To the water's edge, my crop 

Is laden to the gullet's top. Shelley, from Euripides. 

As it was necessary that a considerable portion of time 
should elapse before the disposal of our prize could be 
accomplished, De Ruyter, leaving instructions for my 
guidance during his absence, took his departure in the 
grab to glean the China seas. 

I gladly remained. My time was fully occupied in 
superintending our multifarious occupations. The first 
mate was placed in charge of the prize, with a party of 
men, who removed her crew to the small island on which 
the Malays had built huts for us. The second mate was 
occupied, with a gang of men, in curing jerked buffalo and 
deer-flesh, and salting wild hogs and ducks. I purchased 
a plentiful supply of rice and maize. What leisure time 
I had was devoted to my rural occupations, which I pursued 
with all the zest of novelty, and the zeal of a migrated 
settler. The little cove> in which I used to bathe with 
Zela, and where we had encountered the Jungle Admee, 
or wild man, I constituted my naval arsenal ; and spent 
much of my time there in a tent. This spot was com- 
pletely barricadoed from the rest of the island by a living 
wall of jungle. From a high pinnacle of rock, on the 
east side, we commanded an extensive view to seaward , 



A YOUNGER SON. v 439 

and overlooked the schooner and her Bombay prize. By 
a flag-staff, placed on its summit, I could at all times com- 
municate with the schooner. Towards sunset I always 
returned to sup and sleep on board, that I might entertain 
my prize-guests, and be at my post. 

One night we were all more than ordinarily disposed 
for enjoyment, and the deck was thickly strewed with 
bowls of arrack punchy brandy, Hollands, Bordeaux, Cu- 
racoa, and various other genial fluids — potent elixirs 
which prevent the heart from ossifying, and close up the 
cracks and rents in our clay, laid open by the scorching 
heat of the sun. The Indians say the sap of the mimosa 
is an antidote to sorrow ; and so it is — when fermented; 
and wine can medicine the mind, and " pluck from the 
memory a rooted sorrow," as was exemplied in the person 
of our captive commander. In the early part of the even- 
ing he had been groaning over the loss of his highly 
prized vessel, and told me that, had it pleased Providence 
to deprive him of his wife and six children, he could have 
submitted to its heavy dispensation : — - 

" Eut there, where he had garner'd up his heart, 
Where either he must live, or bear no life, — 
To be discarded thence ! " 

— meaning from his copper-bottomed brig, not his cop- 
per-coloured wife. Yet, now that the subtle vinous spirit 
had touched his soul with its talisman, sorrow fled from 
him, and his stagnant blood, before jellying into jaundice, 
flowed from his heart like a fountain. He talked and 
sung without intermission, wrung my hand, and swore 
I was the best friend and the best fellow in the world. 

Our orgies were interrupted by the old quarter-master's 
hailing, — (i Boat a-hoy ! " when the answer ff Hadjee," 
(pilgrim,) which was our watch- word, gave token of the 
approach of a friend. A large proa, impelled rapidly by 
paddles, shot up alongside, and the Malay chieftain ap- 
peared on the gangway. Whilst he laboured to explain to 
me the reason, aided by his powerful gesticulation, for his 
having so soon returned, altogether inaudible, owing to 
the boatswain-like roar with which the captain was chant- 
ing " Rule Britannia/' a short, squat, business-like looking 
f f 4 



440 ADVENTURES OF 

man made his appearance, and the Malay shoved him to- 
wards me. I arose to receive him. The gravity of his 
square, flat countenance, with a paunch swelling out like 
a lowered top-sail bagging-out with the wind, made me 
laugh. His limbs were preposterously short ; or, as the 
quarter-master said, ce he sailed under jury-masts." In- 
deed if that theory is true, which asserts we have all more 
or less affinity to some bird, beast, or other animal, he was 
indisputably of the order (C sheep- tick." With measured step 
and leaden gravity, he saluted me with, — u I am, Sir, 
Bartholomew Zachariah Jans, and accredited factor of the 
Dutch Company's establishment at Pontiana, and agent of 
Van Olaus Swammerdam. Understanding you have a prize 
to dispose of, I am here to treat and negotiate for the same." 

The captain, I suppose, caught the subject of conversa- 
tion ; for he abruptly stopped his iC Britannia rule the 
waves ! " stared with distended jaw at the accredited 
agent, and changed his note to the drawling and melan- 
choly tune of " Poor Tom Bowling ! " 

Our Dutch factor seated himself on the hatchway with- 
out any apparent diminution of altitude. After he had 
washed his ivories with a cup of skedam (that would have 
surprised even Louis), swallowed, as he observed, to dis- 
lodge the night air which he had inhaled, he protested he 
had never met with such excellent stuff, and, with the 
addition of a bite of biscuit, would take another toothful. 
I directed the quarter-master to see the factor's wants 
supplied, and he went to rouse up the cabin-boy, mutter- 
ing, — " Never see'd or heard tell of such a queer-shaped 
craft as this, — all stowage room ! Why, the Temeraire, 
three-decker, hadn't such a bread-room ! Bite of biscuit! 
— why, a bag of biscuit would float about in his wet 
dock like peas in the ship's coppers ! Why, boy, — 
turn out ! " When he had roused the boy with a kick. 
I heard an order given to bring on deck all the grub in the 
locker. 

Forthwith appeared a piece of cold pork, one of the 
immense fat ducks of the island, and half a Dutch pine- 
apple cheese. I conversed with the Malay, while the 
factor, with immoveable taciturnity, battened on the food, 



A YOUNGER SON. 441 

and filled up the vacuum in his portentous belly. When 
he had cleared the platters, and emptied a stone-bottle of 
gin, he said, u Captain, it is late. There is no good in 
talking on business after supper. The night is close ; — 
I will repose here." 

As he spoke this he lay down, not without difficulty, on 
the main-sail, which was unbent and lying aft to be re- 
paired, covered himself up with a flag, and told the boy to 
fill his pipe. We soon heard him snoring and puffing 
away as he slept. Our bacchanalian party followed his 
example, stretching their relaxed limbs amidst the empty 
bottles and glasses, and reclining their heavy heads, when 
slumber soon closed their dizzy eyes. 

In the morning, after Bartholomew Zachariah Jans had 
supplied his loss in animal heat and moisture, with salt 
pork and Hollands, we proceeded together on board the 
prize. I soon discovered I bad a cool, calculating, subtle 
merchant to contend with. This put me on my mettle ; 
for although I was ignorant and prodigal in money trans- 
actions, as far as they affected myself (for the love of 
money, like that of olives, is a taste to be acquired, not 
instinctive), yet I felt, what many besides Hotspur . have 
expressed ; that, in the way of bargain, I could cavil on 
the ninth part of a hair. In addition to his country's 
characteristic traits of industry, craft, and patience, this 
fellow combined the slily-grasping character of the Low- 
land Scotch. When the Bombay captain, with a sailor's 
frankness, came to treat with the factor about redeeming 
the hull of his vessel, and talked of the peculiar hardship 
of his case, reduced, in an instant, from wealth to extreme 
want, he assumed an impenetrability to human suffering, 
worse than that of a Hollander, Scot, or the devil himself, 
- — I mean that anomaly in nature, an Irish landlord, with 
heart of granite, and head of wood. He stared at the 
bankrupt captain with the blank, remorseless, withering 
apathy, which, in after-years, was recalled to my memory 
by one of the aforesaid ruffianly gasconading bullies, as he 
doggedly listened to the petitions of his squalid and fa- 
mished tenants; and then our factor resumed his scrutiny 
cf the prize-papers, invoices., and bills of loading. Seeing 



442 ADVENTURES OF 

the captain despair, I comforted him with assurances that 
he should not be forgotten in the sale. Upon this the 
factor said; <c I protest against all stipulations. If the 
captain gives a good price, backed by good security, his 
tender will be considered ; that is, if the factory become 
the purchasers, or I am the agent ; always providing that 
Van Olaus Swammerdam approves." 

I was then young, and not knowing that such characters 
are common ones, I felt so disgusted with the tallowy 
brute, that I not only refused to treat with him, but was 
about to treat him with a keelhale, or to throw him over- 
board, and there harpoon him. But, dissuaded from this, 
I dismissed the wretch with revilings and contempt ; 
which, since then, I have oftener seen merited than in- 
flicted. 



CHAPTER XXXI. 

And she began to moan and sigh, 
Because he mused beyond her, knowing well 
That but a moment's thought is passion's passing bell. Keats. 

And her, the homicide and husband-killer. Byron. 

De Ruyter returned, having in tow a small schooner he 
had picked up ; when, without loss of time, we embarked 
every thing belonging to the vessels, got under weigh, and 
proceeded to sea. Without any occurrence of moment, we 
anchored at Batavia in the island of Java. The fever had 
subsided there ; and De Ruyter, besides having the prizes 
to dispose of, had a great deal of business to transact, left 
unfinished by Louis, and took up his quarters on shore. 

We cleared the vessels out, and took in an ample supply 
of provisions, far superior to what we had been for a long 
period accustomed to. The vessels being in excellent order, 
we had, in other respects, little to do ; and I made, with 
Zela, frequent excursions into the mountainous part of this 



A YOUNGER SON. 443 

exceedingly rich and populous island. Its productions, 
timber, grain, and fruit, were of a finer quality than at 
any of the islands I had visited, with the exception of 
some portion of Borneo. General Jansens, the governor, 
an old friend of De Ruyter's, was very civil to me, as he 
had also been on my former visit. We spent much of our 
time at his country house. 

In Europe there is or was a rage for golden-haired vir- 
gins ; but here the mania was for golden complexions. 
At the same merchant's house where De Ruyter lodged, 
there lived a very rich widow, a native of the capital of 
Yug, which was situated on that part of the island still 
governed by its native princes. She was much admired 
at Batavia, and had, by the beauties of her person, at- 
tracted the beaux of the place, who revolved diurnally 
about her doors. She was nearly four feet and a half in 
stature, with a skin so brightly yellow that, when bur- 
nished with oil, it reflected the sun's rays like a gilded 
ball on a cupola, which her rich rotundity resembled. 
Her little jetty eyes sparkled in a face round and plump as 
an orange ; her nose was minute as the bill of a humming 
bird ; her lips, both in substance and dimensions, be- 
tokened her African descent ; and the hairs on her glo- 
bular head, if collected together, would hardly have 
amounted to the cherished number sprouting from my 
upper lip. Yet, such as I have described her, she was 
the beau-ideal of beauty at Java ; and suitors from the 
four quarters of the island thronged to do her homage. 
In that favoured portion of the world the women enjoy 
the inestimable privilege of divorcing themselves from 
their husbands — a law in no danger of becoming obsolete; 
for the rich and peerless widow, now in her twenty-fourth 
year, had already been lawfully married to ten different 
men, — one dead, two killed, six cashiered for neglect of 
duty, and one missing. 

The Javanese are a remarkably dwarfish race, the men 
seldom exceeding five feet, and the women four and a half. 
De Puiyter and myself, respectively measuring six feet, and 
of proportionate brawn and bone, looked Titanic, as, with 
the loose and rolling gait of sailors, we forced our way 



444 ADVENTURES OF 

through the bazaar or crowded lanes, scattering the small 
humam fry right and left, like a couple of benetas among 
a shoal of flying fish. This manly bearing made a deep 
impression on the sensibility of the widow. Henceforth 
she treated the island imps with scorn ; and avowed her 
intention of uniting herself to a man, — no more to frag- 
ments of men, as she termed them, fit only for beggars. 
After a minute scrutiny, and mature deliberation as to 
which she should take, De Ruyter or me, the golden apple 
was allotted to me, both as I was younger, and, thanks to 
the remains of jaundice, far yellower. Nothing doubting 
my rapturous assent, she, therefore, made a formal pro- 
posal in my behalf to De Ruyter, with the offer of an 
unconditional surrender of her charms, and large posses- 
sions of coffee-grounds, sugar, rice, and tobacco plantations, 
houses and tenements, slaves and personals^ enough to put 
me on an equality with the most powerful princes in the 
province of Yug. De Ruyter, with a suitable and com- 
plimentary address, acknowledging the lustre and honour 
of so condescending a mark of her favour, merely hinted 
at the trifling impediment of my being already married. 
This she could not comprehend. A little, white- faced, 
slimly-formed, sickly, girl she had indeed seen with me, 
with hair wound round her head like a turban, great eyes 
and lips, and mouth ridiculously small, all which every 
man must hold in abhorrence. Faugh ! Truly for a sea- 
wife she might do ; she looked like a fish ; and what else 
can live in water ? She then unveiled her dazzling beau- 
ties, and said, " Look at me ! " De Ruyter avowed she 
was the reverse of the sea- girl ; but he observed that men 
had strange and capricious tastes with regard to eating and 
loving. However, he would inform me of her determin- 
ation in my favour. ' c Ah ! " she exclaimed, " send him 
to me ! Let his eyes judge of me ! Let him come and 
behold beauty, that his soul may be pleased, and his heart 
scorched ! " 

A lover of mirth, and delighting in so fair an occasion 
for its full indulgence, De Ruyter bantered me about this 
Princess of Yug, and Royal Highnessed me unceasingly. 
He constituted himself the agent of the widow, and di- 



A YOUNGER SON. 445 

rected her proceedings ; he even offered to marry her as 
proxy for me ; and added fuel to her fires by descanting 
on my merits. The schooner was encumbered with bags 
of coffee, tobacco, and sugar-candy, besides daily and am- 
ple supplies of fresh and preserved fruits, flowers, and 
provisions^ all enforced on my acceptance by the widow 
of Yug. Meantime our interviews were frequent ; for, 
although the Javanese are Mahometans, they conform only 
to one portion of their religion, — that which in all super- 
stitions is the most attended to, — the external. As to 
their acts, they have no other limit than the extent of their 
desires ; the women piously fulfilling that precept engraven 
on their nature, — increase and multiply. I was almost 
angry with Zela, who, instead of being jealous, was as 
much amused as De Ruyter, and aided and abetted his 
practical jokes. In her simple nature and true heart 
suspicion could never enter. The torrid blood of her 
Arabian father was made to keep temperate time in her 
veins by being mingled with her Abassien mother's ; who 
was born and bred in the chilly valleys of Mount Ellbrus, 
the highest of that gigantic range, called the Caucasian 
Mountains, which extend from the Caspian to the Black 
Sea, and uprear their hoary heads amidst the clouds. 



CHAPTER XXXII. 

While the ship's 
Great form is in a watery eclipse, 
Obliterated from the ocean's page, 
And round the wreck the huge sea-monsters sit, 
A horrid conclave, and the whistling wave 
Is heaped over its carcase, like a grave. 

Shelley. — Translation. 

Among the innumerable little islands, scattered in the 
gulf of Sunda, De Ruyter had, in one of his former 
cruises, been becalmed ; and, while exploring and sound- 
ing, had accidentally espied, foundered on a bed of rocks, 



M6 



ADVENTURES OF 



the hull of a small vessel, apparently of European build 
He carefully marked on his chart the spot, and took th» 
most minute bearings of the compass and nautical observ- 
ations, with the design , at a future period, of making an 
attempt to get her up. The weather, which was now 
settled, clear and calm, prompted him to proceed in the 
affair ; particularly as he must be still some time detained 
at Batavia, and the crews were growing rusty and unruly 
from idleness. Having prepared what, was necessary, and 
provided a gang of the most expert divers, fellows kept in 
practice by diving under the ships' bottoms at night, to 
rip off the copper sheets, we got under weigh with the 
land-wind, and, the ensuing day, lay becalmed off the 
little group of five islands, which was our destination. 

We now got out our boats : after pulling about all day, 
under a sun so hot that our brains seemed undergoing the 
process of frying, we happily, before the night set in, hit 
on the very spot marked by De Ruyter; but, the day 
closing, we were compelled to desist till daylight. We 
ran the boats on shore on a pretty island, supped and 
slept; then, with the earliest dawn, we pushed on our 
discovery, till we came on the identical foundered wreck. 
The water was transparent as glass. By sounding on the 
hull of the wreck, we found there was not more than 
twenty feet water from her deck; and that, lying on 
rocks, but little sand had collected near her. We laid 
down a buoy to indicate the spot, and returned to the 
vessels, which were drawing near to take us on board, 
impelled by sweeps ; for so still was the wind, that the 
feathered vanes above the lofty truck drooped motionless. 

With lines, halsers, grapnels, and the other necessary 
materials, not forgetting the divers, we again went towards 
the submerged vessel. As I gazed below, long and 
steadily, so perfectly was every portion of her visible, that 
she forcibly reminded me of those models of ships inclosed 
in glass-cases — the rough and jagged bed on which she 
lay resembling the mimic waves which sometimes surround 
them. Even the heaps of shell-fish that now incrusted 
and peopled her deck with marine life, and the living sea- 
verdure of weeds and mosses, might have been as distinctly 



A YOUNGER SON. 447 

noted and classed as if exhibited on a table. When the 
dark divers descended on her decks, the glass-like element, 
as in a broken mirror, multiplied their forms, till they 
seemed to be the demons, hidden in her hold, rushing up 
in multitudes to defend their vessel, assaulted even under 
the sanctuary of the mighty ocean. 

After many fruitless efforts and long- continued toil, we 
succeeded in getting a purchase on her. Then by sinking 
butts of water, carefully securing them to the tackle affixed 
to the wreck, and restoring their buoyancy by pumping 
out the water from them, at length we moved her, and 
passed strong halsers under her. On the second day the 
grab and schooner were placed on each side of her, the 
number of casks was increased, and we hove on many and 
complicated purchases, till she was fairly suspended, and, 
at length, her almost shapeless hull reluctantly arose to 
the surface. It looked like a huge coffin, in which some 
antediluvian sea- colossus had been entombed. The light 
of day shone strangely on her in crusted, hoary, and slimy 
hull. Sea-stars, crabs, crayfish, and all sorts of shell- 
fish crawled and clung in and about her, amazed at the 
transition from the bottom of the cool element, in which 
they had dwelt, to a fiery dealh from the sun, whose rays, 
darting on their scaled armour, transfixed them as with a 
spear. We turned to, and, by baling, partially cleared 
her of water : so that it was evident, although she leaked 
considerably, she was not bilged. The deck and main- 
hold had been cleared, either by the water or by the people 
of Sumatra, whose fishing-boats might possibly have come 
athwart her ; but the after-hold, which was battened 
securely down, protected by a double deck, and bulk- 
headed off, was untouched. I forgot to mention that, as 
we were baling, we disturbed a huge water-snake at the 
bottom of the hold, which the men had mistaken for the 
bite of a cable, and that he speedily cleared the decks. 
Either he had a taste for shell-fish, or preferred a wooden 
kennel to a coral cave. We made a simultaneous and 
vigorous attack on him with pikes and fire-arms ; yet it 
w T as not till he was gashed like a crimped cod that he 
struck his flag, and permitted us to continue our work. 



448 ADVENTURES OF 

The divers said he might have eaten them when they 
were under water ; — I know not that, but can aver that 
the men, more ferocious and greedy than the snake,, did 
incontinently, now that he was out of water, eat him. 

Having towed the wreck towards the island, we grounded 
her in shoal water, and forced a passage into the after-hold. 
It was of course filled with water : kegs and casks were 
floating in it; these were hoisted out, and having baled 
it dry, we got at the moveables, consisting of sacks of 
damaged grain, powder-barrels, and a heap of other 
articles difficult to define, all jammed up together. In 
poking and raking amongst this mass, according to De 
Ruyter's prognostication, two small boxes, carefully lashed 
and sealed, were hauled out, which, on being opened, 
lightened and repaid us for our toil — they contained above 
eight thousand Spanish dollars, dyed black with the salt 
water, as were, more or less, the vessel and every article 
on board of her. After ransacking every hole and corner, 
we could find nothing else worth the taking away but five 
or six brass swivels, not of much value. We abandoned 
the wreck, and returned to Batavia. 

I should observe that the vessel was apparently of 
Spanish construction, and built of cedar or teak, which, 
notwithstanding it had lain submerged certainly half a 
century, and probably much longer, was still of so hard a 
texture that it turned the edges of the axes. What I 
considered the best portion of the prize was, not the 
dollars, but two barrels of Spanish and other wine, and 
two of arrack. Give me the sea for a cellar ! Such 
delectable fluid never till then moistened the lips, delighted 
the palate, warmed the heart, and entranced the senses ! 
All grew panegyrical and eloquent on the excellence of 
this liquor. The old Rais declared the wine resembled 
the balsam of Keireish, brought from Mecca by the 
Hajjis ; that the shrubs from which the gum exuded 
sprung from the blood of the prophet's tribe, slain in 
battle ; and that it not only cured every malady, and 
subdued every evil, but had restored true believers to 
life ! 



A VOUNGER SON. 449 



CHAPTER XXXIII, 

Fierce, wan 9 
And tyrannising was the lady's look, 
And over them a gnarled staff she sho<;k. Keats. 

The ghost of folly haunting my swee*- dreams. Ibid. 

Rumour having arrived at Batavia that we had discovered 
a bank of Spanish dollars, by running aground on them, 
from which we had loaded our vessels, and that we had 
fished casks of wine out of the sea, with the date 1550 
marked on them, hooped with living serpents, the grab 
was crowded with visiters, all anxious to drink the wine 
or arrack. Had either of them been the real elixir of 
immortality, it could not have been more devoutly hal- 
lowed, or more greedily swallowed. The greasy Dutch 
merchants congregated on board, and spent the night in 
chanting hallelujahs to express their delight; so that, 
had we not at the commencement substituted other wines 
and spirits, we should have expended the real stuff at one 
bout. As it was, it consoled us afterwards, during many 
a weary night of storm and toil, and suppled our joints 
when they had become rigid and brittle from heat and 
drought. 

Our prizes were disposed of, and Be Ruyter did not 
neglect the interests of the Bombay captain, his prisoner. 
His much-cherished vessel was once more made over to 
him at a price below the lowest estimate, and himself and 
crew were liberated. This, and what else was needful, 
being concluded, we again weighed anchor, and took our 
departure from Java. 

The widow of Yug was astounded at the intelligence of 
our going out of port for an indefinite period. Love over- 
coming her antipathy to the sea, she followed us in a 
row-boat, screaming, making signals, and scratching — 
thank Heaven, not me, but herself! Her melo-dramatic 
fury augmented to such a pitch, when she found I did 
not heave-to for her, that the devilish breeze she kicked 

G G 



450 ADVENTURES OF 

up astern of us seemed to freshen the land-wind. With 
my telescope I could observe her venting a portion of her 
wrath on the slaves who rowed the boat, keeping time 
with the lusty strokes of a bamboo on their naked backs. 
Aware that a man has no more chance with a woman, 
armed with the offensive and defensive weapons of tongue, 
tears, nails, and bamboo, than in a river with an alligator, 
I, for the first time in my life, acted prudently, and fled 
the fight. The widow of Yug, had her spirit not been 
clogged with clay, might possibly have pursued me round 
the world ; but as soon as the boat got into the swell 
outside the port, and began to pitch and toss, I discovered 
my princess — or rather, I did not, for she had sunk 
down in the bottom of the boat, which was slued to the 
right-about, and without delay vigorously impelled towards 
the shore ; so that I may say of her — 

" She loved and she towed away." 

I had been so pestered and persecuted by this she- 
dragon, who one day crammed me with kisses and cakes, 
and the next would have tattooed me with her nails, that 
I vowed henceforth never to be lured into a widow's den ; 
for the malignant ferocity of a tiger-cat in a gin, is 
nothing to a veteran widow balked of her will. 

I cannot tell why it was, but, as we left the harbour of 
Batavia and its begrimed water, the clear, pure, deep blue 
of the Indian ocean, which, since I had commanded the 
schooner, had always filled my heart with delight, now, 
on the contrary, overwhelmed me with sadness, that I 
could neither shake off nor repress. Doubt and dread 
clouded my mind for the first time. Yet I was well in 
health, and Zela (for I questioned her) was perfectly well ; 
and this was authenticated by the regularity of her pulse, 
the brightness of her eye, her coral lip, and her breath 
sweeter than the odour from May-flowers on a spring 
morning. What then could it be ? not the widow ! — 
her love and her parting curses were forgotten ere her 
boat was out of sight. Did her spirit cling to me like a 
vampyre? I remembered afterwards that, in her male- 
dictions, she had so threatened to haunt me if I abandoned 



A YOUNGER SON. 451 

her ; and there were rumours, which 1 laughed at, of her 
having dealt foully with others. Human life is held 
cheap in the East ; and, at Java, a few rupees sufficed to 
hire an assassin to stab or poison, — and poison was there 
indigenous, it flowed from trees and shrubs, nor were the 
natives inexpert in its application. It did not, however, 
appear to have been employed on me ; and now I was out 
of its reach. Once, I remember, in the early part of the 
evening, dosing on the couch, I was awakened by frightful 
visions. At first the widow was caressing me, and I 
shrinking from her embraces with repugnance. She faded 
away, when the wrinkled and withered form of an old 
yellow hag seized me by the throat, griped me hard, and 
attempted to force through my clenched teeth a fruit she 
held in her hand. I struggled to free myself by wrench- 
ing back the fiend's icy fingers ; but my strength aban- 
doned me, and the fruit was at my lips, when the faithful 
Adoo appeared, plucked it from me, and exclaimed, (C It is 
poison!" Then came the fiery Javanese prince mounted 
on his blood-red horse ; his hoofs were on my head and 
heart; when Zela, clothed in bright, glittering, white 
robes, led by a dim spectral figure, black as night, threw 
herself on me, and said, "I will die! — you shall live!" 
At this the dark spectre unveiled herself, and I recognised 
the livid and ghastly features of old Kamalia. With 
witch-like solemnity she thus addressed me: — cc Stranger, 
you are forsworn ! The best blood of Arabia you have 
polluted ! Your heart is bruised, — my child's you have 
broken ! " 

Struggling to rise, I awoke. My head was dizzy, my 
heart sick at the dreadful vision, which has haunted me 
through life, and it is in vain I strive to forget it* In 
my sleep it pursues me, and, ever as it recurs, it is the 
more frightful, as it assures me of some horrible change. 
Often since then have I arisen from my bed, haggard, 
sick, and suffering agonies, such as none but devils or 
inquisitors can inflict. 

On the second day of our leaving port, steering a south- 
east course, we fell in with two fine French frigates and a 
g g 2 



452 ADVENTURES OF 

three-masted schooner, returning to Batavia from a cruise. 
The lubberly fellows were elated at having chased an 
English frigate and brig of war ; which, by the by, from 
what I observed of their sickly, weak, and unsoldier-like 
case, and disorderly condition, might have advantageously 
brought them to action. By their description of the 
English vessels I knew the frigate to be the one I had 
abandoned ; and old Hoofs, I had always thought, was 
fonder of farming than fighting. Like a blustering bully, 
the French commodore, now that the enemy was out of 
sight, talked valiantly of what he would have done, had he 
come up with the Englishmen ; adding, ee When we saw 
you, I thought we had got hold of the John Bulls." 

De Ruyter's curled lip indicated his contempt of the 
vaunter ; and he observed, as we returned on board our 
craft, that the fellow had been so accustomed to run away, 
the having chased, for once in his life, had capsised his 
brains. " What a pity," he said, " that the French, who 
excel all other nations in the theory of seamanship, and in 
practical naval architecture, cannot find men to fight at 
sea. They are like flying-fish, a prey for every fish that 
swims, and for every bird that flies. From the oldest 
records we trace that all other nations, powerful enough to 
organise a naval force, have produced men able and worthy 
to command with honour and glory. The naval annals of 
barbarians, then of Greece, Rome, and Carthage, down to 
the modern history of Spain, Portugal, Holland, Sweden, 
Norway, Denmark, and England, have severally teemed 
with naval heroes, who shed a bright lustre on the coun- 
tries which gave them birth. France exhibits a solitary 
exception, a dull obscurity, unenlightened by a single 
bright page ; a blotted chapter in history, a waste log- 
book ; the eye in vain seeks for one spot to rest on, a 
single star, as a beacon or sea-mark, to guide the lonely 
pilot, or stimulate to emulation the aspiring sailor -boy !" 

I may here remark, that this large and beautiful French 
frigate was afterwards captured in an action with one of 
the smallest English frigates, and now carries the British 
jack. In her first cruise, under the victorious flag of 
England, she again added to our naval force, by takings 



A YOUNGER SON. 453 

after a very sanguinary and gallant action, another of 
France's finest frigates in the Indian seas. 

We stood along the eastern coast of Java, towards the 
Sunda Islands, and fell in with nothing but the small 
vessels bound or belonging to that archipelago, burthened 
with cargoes of coir, oil, jaggeree, ghee, and cocoa-nuts, 
richer to them than Spanish galleons of gold and silver, 
but in our eyes too worthless to waste a thought on. 



CHAPTER XXXIV. 

And their baked lips, with many a bloody crack, 

Suck'd in the moisture, which like nectar stream'd ; 

Their throats were ovens, their swollen tongues were black 

As the rich man's in hell, who vainly scream'd 

To beg the beggar, who could, not rain back 

A drop of dew, when every drop had seem'd 

To taste of heaven ; — if this be true, indeed, 

Some Christians have a comfortable creed. Byrj.\. 

Hence shalt thou quickly to the watery vast ; 

And there, ere many days be overpast, 

Disabled age shall seize thee; and even then 

Thou shalt not go the way of aged men, 

But livefand wither, cripple, and still breathe. Keats. 

A long- continued gale of wind drove us down towards 
the coast of New Holland. When it had broken, and 
while we were labouring in the heavy swell which followed, 
we discerned a small boat, evidently in distress, and we 
wore down to her aid. Owing to the swell, and the wind 
having moderated, it was some time ere the grab succeeded 
in getting alongside of her, to take her crew on board, 
which consisted of four sailors and a master's-mate. 
They belonged to an English frigate, which, having cap- 
tured a small brigantine, had put them on board to take 
charge of her. The prize had been separated from the 
frigate by a white squall in the straits of Sunda, damaged 
in her masts and rigging. A north-wester, against which 
they could make no head, had driven them a long way to 
the south-east. In this hapless state their frail and crazy 

Q Q 3 



454 ADVENTURES OF 

bark had been struck abaft by a heavy sea, which had 
loosened her stern-post, and shattered the frame- work of 
her stern. The water poured in so fast, that it was only 
by the greatest promptitude and dexterity they had suc- 
ceeded in getting a clumsy boat, which lay amid-ship, afloat, 
just as their vessel foundered. They had no time to secure 
any thing but themselves; a boy and two men were 
drowned, probably in attempting to save something. The 
boat was as old and worthless as the vessel to which she 
belonged ; and, till she was somewhat seasoned in the 
water, they were all occupied in baling with their caps, 
and in stuffing, with rags and coir-oakum, the crevices 
and rents which the sun had made. Fortunately the boat, 
as she lay on board, had been used as a receptacle for old 
spare canvass, oars, light sails, the fag-ends of ropes, and, 
what was now of far greater importance, a coop with six 
ducks, an old, grisly he-goat, and a hen, that had demurely 
laid its egg, as an offering, for its undisturbed sanctuary 
in the sheltered part of the bow, where it had probably 
rcosted for years in solitary security. The seamen thanked 
Providence as they beheld their live-stock. Being up to 
tl eir knees in water, dripping with water, water having 
destroyed their vessel, and now threatening to overwhelm 
them in its foaming billows, and with an ocean of water 
all around them, some time elapsed ere the awful words 
were uttered, " There is no fresh water in the boat ! " 
Every voice echoed, in preternatural sounds, " There is 
no fresh water ! " Every eye wildly glanced at the boat, 
and around the sea, and again was despondingly muttered, 
e( There is no water ! Oh, God ! we must perish ! " 

Anticipated thirst soon parched their lips, and their 
stout hearts quailed. Other clangers, past and present, 
were forgotten. A leaky, rent, mis-shapen boat, hardly 
big enough to contain their diminished crew, as it lay 
floundering in the trough of the sea, like a harpooned por- 
poise, was nothing — if they had but water. Fortunately 
their officer, though the youngest among them, was the 
ablest and manliest, at least in mind ; by which boon, 
nature had amply compensated him for a somewhat slender 
and delicate form. He had a spirit greater than was con- 



A YOUXGER SON. 455 

tained in the broad breasts of the brawniest and the 
bulkiest. Evil fortune had persecuted him in many shapes ; 
she kept him at the bottom of her wheel, but could not 
crush him. He rallied the sunken spirits of his men ; 
he told them they were near land ; they had sails ; there 
was wind enough to fill them ; the boat, though broken, 
was buoyant ; they were few in number ; thirst could be 
borne for days ; besides, they had live-stock, and their 
blood was nearly as refreshing as water; and the clouds 
gave promise of rain. The men knew their officer, and 
had confidence in him. His calmness and fearless bear- 
ing did more than his words. The hopes he had so con- 
fidently expressed seemed realised. They grew calm, and 
their reason and obedience were restored. 

The mate having succeeded, if not in rendering his 
boat-water tight, yet in diminishing the leaks, so that it 
required but occasional baling, next set about putting sail 
on the boat. For this purpose he selected an old flying 
jib, and, with a broken studding-sail- boom for a mast, 
contrived the best and safest form of carrying canvass that 
could possibly be contrived, representing what sailors call 
a shoulder-of-mutton rig, the larger part (or the body of 
the sail) being in the body of the boat, To be driven into 
the South Indian Ocean, a desert world of waters, was 
certain and inevitable destruction. In order to avoid this 
it was necessary, at all risks, to haul his w T ind as much as 
possible to the eastward, with an oar for a rudder. With 
consummate skill he, in some degree, effected this ; but it 
required an unerring eye and steady hand to keep his 
ricketty and rudderless boat from being buried beneath 
the threatening waves, or capsised by the furious blasts 
which swept over it. They had neither compass, chart, 
nor instruments to guide them on their lonely way ; no- 
thing but the stars and sun — the latter, glaring and 
fiery, they hardly dared to look at. Their only hope was 
to make one of the Sunda islands, or, failing in that, the 
coast of New Holland, or to be met by some wandering 
bark. 

Thus day and night they toiled on, laving, at long in- 
tervals, their white and parched lips with the blood of the 
gg4 



456 



ADVENTURES OP 



panting goat, which was itself expiring for want of mois- 
ture. Every glazed eye scrutinised, with horrible preci- 
sion, the accuracy of the measured allowance, apparently 
numbering the red drops, as doled out by the officers in 
scanty portions. The animal was then cut up, and its 
interior, which still contained jellied blood and some mois- 
ture, was balanced and divided with the care and exacti- 
tude with which a miser weighs his gold. The mate said 
he merely extracted the fluid, chewing but not swallowing 
the substance, and endeavoured to impress on his com- 
rades the advantage of following his example. A few did, 
but the greater part could not control the fierceness of 
famine raging in their vitals. cc At this," the mate added, 
ee from the torture I experienced, I did not wonder ; but 
the event proved I was in the right. For, by not eating, 
I endured thirst better ; and, after a few days, I had no 
inclination to eat, feeling a relief by keeping some sub- 
stance in my mouth, no matter what, to chew ; — tobacco, 
of which there was a little, was the best. We all watched 
with painful and intense anxiety the formation and changes 
of the clouds. Every speck in the heavens was commented 
■ on and scrutinised, its form, density, and altitude. At 
last, after successive hopes and disappointments, our eyes 
dim and our hearts sick, we beheld a dark and heavy 
cloud, evidently surcharged with rain, coming towards 
us. Those who have seen, or can conceive, the exhausted 
pilgrim, parched and perishing on a desert, wading through 
shifting mounds of scorching sands, with feeble gait and 
maddening brain, when his wistful and eager eyes catch a 
first glimpse of the distant well, may faintly imagine what 
were our sensations. When the first drops touched our 
shrivelled lips, and fell on our throbbing temples, every 
gasping mouth was distended wide to heaven for the fall- 
ing manna ; our parched throats heaved and swelled like 
the waves. Fervent prayers were muttered by men who 
would have died in battle blaspheming ; but they availed 
not; the watery cloud, on which their lives were sus- 
pended, mockingly displayed its riches, niggardly sprinkled 
them with a few scanty drops, as a sample of the inestim- 
able treasure it contained, and fleeted onwards, till they 



A YOUNGER SON. 4-57 

Deheid it mingle its waters in waste — in the briny 
ocean ! They covered, in despair, their inflamed eyes 
with their cracked and spongy hands, and groaned in 
agony ! " 

But who can go on describing tortures such as these 
men endured, every instant augmenting, comprising an 
eternity of immitigable sufferings though marked in the 
calendar but as seven days and seven hours ? — a space 
so fleeting, to the free and happy, that it passes by and is 
scarcely noted, while on these forlorn seamen seven days 
did the work of seventy years. With rheumed, glassy, 
blood- shot eyes, haggard, wrinkled, and hollow cheeks, 
sunken mouth, swollen, slaty, and cracked lips, contracted 
nostrils, thinned and whitened hair, collapsed muscles, 
feeble and tottering gait, sepulchral and inarticulate voices, 
gabbling more like brutes than men ; can the extremest 
age to which human existence has yet been stretched, with 
all its withering palsy and impotency, do more ? In seven 
days and a few hours, youth, intellect, strength, were thus 
blasted ! Let me be scorched to death in a volcano, blown 
into the air from a cannon, buried alive in the earth, 
drowned in water, but let me not die by wanting it ! 

Two, in their frenzy, threw themselves in the sea, 
slaked their thirst in its briny waters, and died under its 
cool canopy. One, after lying in idiotic insensibility, 
burst into fierce, yelling madness, tore the living flesh 
from his limbs, sucked his own blood, lay down, slept, 
and awoke no more. Four, besides the officer, remained 
on the seventh day. The sky, the ocean, the boat, every 
thing looked burning red and fiery. They had no hope 
when, on the morning of the eighth day, we rescued them 
from their shattered boat. What a crazed, wild, and 
ghastly band were they ! — more like corpses uncharnelled, 
than living men. The weakest of the party, the mate, 
seemed alone to have retained his senses. After he was 
hoisted on the deck, and had collectedly looked around^ 
he said, " We are dying the death of the damned ! — 
Give my men water ! " Then, as if his last duty was 
performed, he pointed to his frothy lip, but could not 
speak; and the spirit which had borne him up whilst 



458 ADVENTURES OF 

contending with danger, now released from its post of 
duty, seemed to flee away, and his body sunk down life- 
less. Certainly he would have died, calm and unshaken 
as he had lived, but for the skill of De Ruyter and Van 
Scolpvelt, who arrested the flight of life while hovering on 
his lips. After long struggles, lying convulsed with pain, 
his strength slowly returned, when the first intelligible 
and connected words he uttered were, " Who are you ? 
the devil ? " — (this was to Van the doctor) — " where 
am I ? " Another long interval elapsed, during which 
his intellect was besieging its abandoned citadel, when 
consciousness was restored, and he said, " Where are my 
men ? Have they got water ? Let me see them, — poor 
fellows ! " On reiterated assurances that all their wants 
were supplied, he asked for water for himself. A small 
portion was put to his lips. Like all the fluids which had 
been administered to him and his men, a very small 
quantity was swallowed ; the larger portion came up again 
tinctured with blood, the swollen and inflamed glands 
having nearly stopped up the windpipe. His breast and 
temples were kept continually moistened with vinegar and 
water, which diminished his pain. He constantly re- 
peated, " This is not hell, for in hell there is no water." 
Bleeding and bathing proved to be the most efficacious 
remedies ; but for these, De Ruyter thought they could 
not have been saved. Yet, after all, and with the whole 
skill of Van, we were only successful in preserving the 
mate and two of the men. One died raving mad ; and it 
may be observed that he had drunk of sea-water, and par- 
taken of the blood of the man who had died mad in the 
boat,. The other had secretly and voraciously seized on 
the old hen, which he had appropriated to himself. The 
inflammation in his throat completely closed up the pas- 
sage, and, bursting a blood-vessel, he too died. The re- 
maining three were long subject to violent retchings and 
convulsive fits, to which it was believed they would be 
always subject. 

The mate's recovery was the most decisive and rapid. 
This young man, whose name was Darvell, remained long 
on board with us, and I commenced a friendship with him 



A YOUNGER SON. 459 

in the off-hand way of sailors. We liked each other, and, 
without saying a word on the subject, hecame friends for 
life. His was a short one ; as it has been with all those 
to whom I have linked myself, and they are many, — or 
rather, they were many. At the age of thirty not one was 
left me. Friendship is dead to me ; nothing is left but 
its memory. Never more will friendship's balm refresh 
my withered heart. Meaner things have had their mau- 
soleums, their columns, and their pyramids ; on me de- 
volves the task to write the epitaphs of my departed friends, 
and it shall be done by narrating their deeds. I have 
said Darvell's life was short ; his restless and daring 
spirit forced him on from danger to danger, ever the leader 
of that devoted band called the forlorn hope, but no 
longer of the pretorian phalanxes of kings. His riper 
judgment shook off, with disdain, the fetters which had 
manacled him in boyhood. Darvell, on his return to 
Europe, became a leader of the forlorn hope of the heroic 
few, who are to be found in the van of those fighting for 
liberty. No sooner was the flag of freedom unfurled in 
the New World by spirits like his own, than he hastened 
to join their ranks. His bleached bones may still glitter 
on the yellow sands of Peru ; where the small vessel he 
commanded was driven on shore and wrecked, in a chival- 
rous action he fought with a Spanish force ten times his 
superior. 



CHAPTER XXXV. 

This Paphian army took its march 
Into the outer courts of Neptune's state, Keats. 

Whence came ye, merry damsels ! whence came ye ? 
So many, and so many, and such glee ? " Ibid. 

The gale, having for some days abated, was followed by 
a calm, in which we lay pitching and tossing, owing to 



460 ADVENTURES OF 

the heavy swell, without advancing, like a rocked cradle, 
or the beating time of soldiers with their feet. The ele- 
ments, like those who live in them, rest after toil ; and, 
in tranquil waters and balmy breezes, we regained the lee- 
way we had lost, keeping a north-east course, till we soon 
found ourselves amongst the Sunda islands, which spangle 
the eastern ocean, thick, bright, and countless as the fleecy 
clouds of a mackerel sky in summer, defying the patient 
and indefatigable toil of successive navigators to designate 
or number. They were of all forms and sizes, beginning 
from the embryo coral reef, over which swept the yet un- 
wrinkled wave, where nature's minutest architect was at 
work, carrying on her mightiest designs ; that little dark 
artificer laying its foundations under the ocean, where 
mariner's plummet-line could never sound, and uprearing 
islands and uniting them into vast continents. Those 
already completed were fair and beautiful, with mountain 
stream and valley ; lawns, and deep dells, covered with 
forests, fruits, and flowers ; Edens where nature sponta- 
neously yielded all that men should want. The listless 
islanders, as we approached them in our boats, seemed to 
gaze on us with wonder at the folly of the strange people, 
who could wander restless about on the desert waste of 
waters, in barks built of trees, under groves of which they 
dosing] y lay, pampered by their fruits, never thinned to 
form even a canoe. By signs we made known our want 
of water and fruit ; they pointed to the stream and the 
trees. They neither aided nor opposed our landing, and 
procuring what we wanted. 

Many lovely islands were uninhabited ; others might be 
considered as civilised, for they had commerce, vessels, and 
arms, with their never- failing attendants, war, vice, and 
robbery. At some distance from the large island of Cum- 
bava we fell in with two large fleets of proas, engaged in 
desperate conflict. There being scarcely any wind stirring 
at the time, the night was closing in ere we approached 
them near enough to interrupt their naval contention. 
When I observed to De Ruyter that I supposed the navies 
of these islanders were contending for supremacy over the 
sea, he replied, " Or fighting for a cocoa-nut !" — for he 



^A YOUNGER SON. 46 J 

perceived they were cur friends, the warlike Malays, whose 
proas were attacking the cocoa-nut-trading proas of Cum- 
bava, and the Celebes, whose merchant-fleets had combined 
against the men-of-war of the former. He added, ic The 
Malays have met their match ; for both these islanders are 
heroically addicted to fighting, and wall perhaps unite 
together and attack us — so clear your decks." 

During the night it was calm, and at day-break the 
Malay fleet paddled towards us : the traders, keeping an 
opposite course, were soon out of sight. The Malays 
evidently were deceived by our appearance, and mistook us 
for traders, as a few shots from our heavy guns changed 
their war-whoops to shrieking cries, and they fled in dis- 
order. Shortly after, we brought-to on the easternmost 
side of the island of Cumbava, continuing to seize every 
opportunity of supplying our vessels with fresh provisions, 
and most of the islands furnishing us with an abundance of 
bananas, shadoc, cocoa-nuts, cabbage-palm, jams, and 
sweet potatoes, and many with wild hogs, fowls, and fish ; 
so that we lived well, and had little sickness. 

While we lay at Cumbava, bartering for what we wanted 
at a small village, we had all supped on board the grab. 
I was returning to the schooner with Zela, the night being, 
as was usual, exceedingly clear and calm, when I heard a 
blowing and splashing in the water near the shore, as from 
a shoal of walrusses, and its calm surface was broken and 
glittering with sparks of light, bright as fire-flies. Zela 
said, — 

u Hasten on board ! — the natives are swimming off 
from the shore ; and I have heard my father say they often 
attack vessels by this mode of quietly surprising them." 

I hailed the grab, which was just ahead of me, gave 
them warning, hastened on board, and roused up the men 
to arm themselves. Then, standing on the gangway, I 
clearly distinguished a multitude of dark heads, with long 
black hair floating on the water, rapidly nearing us. We 
hailed them in half a dozen languages, but received no 
other answer than a loud flapping in the water, and a 
shrill chirping sound, more like a flock of these birds by 
sailors called Mother Carey's Chickens, getting on the wing, 



402 



ADVENTURES OP 



than the approach of warriors. Some of my men wanted 
to fire on them ; hut I, observing that, whatever they were, 
they were unarmed, forbad it. Zela and her little Adoo 
cried out, — 

u Why, they are all women ! — what do they want ? " 
And so they were. 

A loud and simultaneous laugh burst from the grab, and 
my quarter-master, holding a night-glass, exclaimed, — 

ec Look, captain, there be a shoal of mermaids a-boarding 
the grab ! " 

Still not knowing what to make of it, I ordered our fierce 
and armed sailors to stand back, and waved my hand, 
making signs for the floating visiters to come on board. 
This was quickly understood, and, in a few minutes we 
were boarded in all directions by these aquatic ladies, who 
clambered up by the chains, the gangway, the bow, and the 
stern, till our deck was covered. There was no doubt as to 
the sex of these our unexpected assailants ; and our men, 
with their pistols, cutlasses, and boarding-pikes, cut a 
ridiculous figure enough as they confronted women, who, 
so far from having arms of offence, or being scaled in 
armour of defence, had no other weapons than what nature 
had furnished them with, and no other covering than an 
immensity of jetty long hair. Yet, in justice to the ladies, 
I must say that many of them, if not fair, were young, 
sleek-skinned, and of pretty Moorish features ; but I was 
so entirely devoted to Zela, that my thoughts never veered 
for an instant to any other. True it was, I had been 
boyishly indiscreet enough to give into the joke of banter- 
ing and playing pranks on the widow of Yug. I had 
better have played them on the stealthy and malignant 
panther ; for what is so relentlessly and dastardly cruel as 
a vicious and disappointed woman ? But, vanish, accursed 
retrospection ! Keep aloof from me, memory, thou subtle 
and intruding devil ! 

With the dawn of day the amphibious females assembled, 
like a flock of teal, on deck, having gleaned the sailors* 
offerings of buttons, nails, beads, old shirts, waistcoats, 
jackets, and other discarded clothing, with which they had 
ridiculously bedizened themselves. The vanity of the sex 



A YOUNGER SON. 46^ 

was now in high excitation ; for I observed, as they strutted 
about in their motley-coloured attire, partially covering 
their persons, one in a check shirt, another with a white 
jacket, some with only a solitary stocking or shoe, and 
others with gaudy handkerchiefs instinctively applied to 
their heads, that they scanned, with watchful eyes, which 
among them had got what they considered the most valuable 
present. At length they all became fixed in astonishment 
and jealousy, at beholding a frightful squaw, who had suc- 
cessfully insinuated herself into the good graces of the 
quarter-master, whom she had so bewitched, that he, with 
princely prodigality, bestowed on her a robe of honour, an 
ancient scarlet waistcoat ! This was the identical vest that, 
sparkling on his broad chest, had caused such devastation 
in the hearts of the fair damsels at Plymouth, and to which 
he confessedly owed much of his good fortune, having won 
the heart and hand of a celebrated west- country belle from 
a host of suitors. All the water-nymphs, at the sight of 
this brilliant squaw proudly stalking among them, like a 
queen pre-eminent, clapped their hands with a divided 
feeling of envy and delight ; then shrieked, and, eager to 
avoid comparison, hastened to hide their inferior decora- 
tions by plumping headlong into the water, chattering and 
clattering like sea-mews till they reached the land. 



CHAPTER XXXVI. 

The earth, whose mine was on its face, unsold, 

The glowing sun and produce all its gold ; 

The freedom which can call each grot a home ; 

The general garden where all steps may roam ; 

Where Nature owns a nation as her child, 

Exulting in the enjoyments of the wild ; 

Their shells, their fruits, the only wealth they know, 

Their unexploring navy the canoe ; 

Their sport the dashing breakers and the chase ; 

Their strangest sight an European face. Byron. 

To avoid a repetition of these nocturnal orgies, we got 
under weigh, threading cautiously, and with difficulty, the 



404 ADVENTURES OF 

groups of islands ; many of which were unknown, or un- 
marked on any chart. At some we landed, while our 
vessels lay off and on, awaiting us; and, in calm weather, 
we anchored at others, where we generally found fruits and 
water. Although De Ruyter, hesides his being an able 
navigator, had the advantage of much personal knowledge 
of the Indian archipelago, yet we had much to contend 
with ; for the multitude of local currents, in the space of 
a few leagues, ran to every point in the compass ; and 
often were so impetuous that our vessels, even with favour- 
able breezes, were hurried along in contrary directions to 
each other, and to the course we were steering. Sometimes 
we were driven through channels of coral reefs, embayed 
by shoals, out of which we had infinite difficulty in groping 
our way with the lead. Many times we thus parted com- 
pany, and more than once jostled together. Besides the 
momentary fear of being wrecked, the toil and hardship 
we endured is not to be described ; although our vessels 
were admirably adapted for the intricacy of the navigation. 
At sea, scudding fast in a fine vessel, , or, on the desert, 
galloping on a fleet horse, I have felt my blood, hurrying 
through its channels, tingling with pleasure ; but, like all 
pleasures of strong excitement, they are short-lived, and 
dearly purchased by the painful lassitude which follows 
such enjoyment. On the other hand, I have felt my 
soul thrilled with rapture, unalloyed by retrospection or 
deadened by satiety, in wandering over and exploring 
unknown, or at least unmarked, and uninhabited islands, 
in the Indian archipelago, accompanied by my Zela. 
Gazing in mute astonishment at every fruit, herb, tree, and 
flower, our very ignorance of their names and properties 
enhanced our admiration. Even those we were familiar 
with seemed of a more exquisite description. The forma- 
tion and hues of the rocks, sands, shells, and weeds, to our 
enthusiastic and untaught eyes, resembled nothing we had 
previously seen. The very sea around, the noise of the 
surf, the sky, the clouds above, the untainted atmosphere 
we breathed, the birds, the lizards, the insects, and larger 
animals, appeared new and strange. Injhat awful solem- 
nity of nature, undisturbed by human innovation, carrying 



A YOUNGER SON. 465 

on her works in beautiful grandeur, Zela scrutinised, with 
girlish delight, some little unknown floweret, whilst I stood 
entranced, gazing on a titanic treee, on whose wide-spread- 
ing branches monkeys and parrots had formed their king- 
doms, and under whose broad shade an army might have 
stood sheltered. We often thought ourselves to be, and 
perhaps we were, the first intruders on these hallowed 
solitudes. The birds and beasts viewed us with wonder, 
but fled not. They thought, or rather I thought for them, 
" What, is man Pt last come here? Not satisfied with 
what he calls usurping the four portions of the globe, 
must his dominion spread over the fifth, some space of 
which is yet untenanted by him ? Has Providence, like 
a step-father, abandoned his first children, robbing us of 
our birth-right, leaving us no place where we may rest our 
weary wings ? Why is life given us to be taken away for 
man's pastime, to be tortured to pamper his insatiable 
appetites? He is a monster, endowed with sovereignty 
over Nature's works, only to mar and destroy them V 

As I am not writing a history of discovery, I leave to 
be described, by more systematic circumnavigators, with 
all the honour and profit thereunto accruing, every one of 
these islands, now comprehended in the fifth division of 
the world ; limiting myself, as at starting, to simply the 
history of ray own life, and that which is immediately 
connected with it. 

After a long and circuitous navigation we made the 
Aroo islands, one of which none that has seen can ever 
forget. It lies in the centre of the group, and far surpasses 
all that the most imaginative of eastern poets has conceived. 
The birds of the sun (or, as they are usually called, birds 
of Paradise) are natives of this paradise ; as is the lory, 
whose varied and distinctly marked colours exceed in 
brightness the rarest tulips. Then there are the mina, of 
deeper blue than the sky, with crest, beak, and legs out- 
glittering gold, the wild peacock, and an infinity of little 
scarlet humming-birds, dazzling the sight with their ex- 
treme beauty ; while the spices on which they live fill the 
air with sweet smells. Zela screamed with joy, and wept 
to go on shore ; but the wild islanders forbad it. 

H H 



466 ADVENTURES OF 

Getting a distant view of Papua, or New Guinea, we 
kept a northerly course for a few days; but, our salt pro- 
visions becoming scanty, we changed our course to the 
westward, and returned by a parallel line, till we arrived at 
the Dutch spice-island of Amboyna. Here we found them 
in all the bustle of an expected attack by the English, to 
which, however, the governor did not give credit; and 
De Ruyter was too politic to give him his real opinion 
on the subject, lest efforts might have been made to detain 
us, in order to assist in their defence, or, at least, our 
supplies would not have been attainable. We therefore 
hastily purchased what was necessary, or rather what we 
could get, took our departure, and soon after captured a 
small vessel, being the third prize we had made on this 
cruise. She was freighted — or, as the quarter-master, 
who prided himself on correct orthoepy, persisted in saying, 
frighted — with cloves, mace, and nutmegs. We tran- 
shipped the spicery, and let the vessel go. 

Our next destination was the island of Celebes, which 
we made without encountering any event worth recording, 
and anchored off Fort Rotterdam, at Macassar, a Dutch 
settlement, as the name of the fort indicates. This island 
lies between Java and Borneo ; it is shaped like a huge 
tarantula, a small body with four disproportionately long 
legs, which stretch into the sea in narrow and lengthened 
peninsulas. 



CHAPTER XXXVII. 



But feast to-night ! to-morrow we depart I 

Strike up the dance, the festal bowl fill high, 

Drain every drop ! to-morrow we may die. Byron. 

We were all delighted, after our long, fatiguing, and 
anxious navigation among the islands, to find ourselves 
securely moored in a beautiful harbour near to a very pretty 



A YOUNGER SON. 4$7 

European town, which supplied all our wants. For some 
days the discipline on board was relaxed, and we revelled 
in the enjoyment of abundance, and the luxury of undis- 
turbed rest ; which can only be duly appreciated by those 
who have hungered and toiled. Several Dutch vessels were 
lying here, bound to the spice-islands ; from these we re- 
plenished our stores of European articles, such as wine, 
cheese, biscuits, and an ample supply of genuine skedam, 
which poor Louis used to say was indispensable as the 
rudder and compass. 

As a neutral vessel lay in the port, we shipped Darvell, 
and the men we had rescued, on board her. Both De 
Ruyter and myself parted from that gallant young officer 
with deep regret. In those days of my youth my heart 
was glowing with feeling, and, as has been seen, readily 
formed alliances with noble minds like Darvell's. Such 
men as he (though I cannot believe there are many) may 
still live ; and, perhaps, occasionally, I may come unknow- 
ingly in contact with them ; but my heart is chilled, and 
my affections almost extinguished. I no longer feel my- 
self moved to claim kindred with them ; my soul is ab- 
sorbed in selfish and vain regret for those I have loved and 
lost, and shrinks from new ties, if not with loathing, yet 
with cold indifference. I am become ascetic and morbid ; 
so I will not slander human nature by contracting Darvell 
and the friends of my youth, such as they were to me, with 
the worldlings among whom I now associate, and whom, 
with sneering mockery, I designate as Ci dear," on every 
scrap of paper which necessity compels me to address to 
them, either for the purpose of an invitation to dinner, or an 
appointment for a duel. Let me, however, although no verbal 
critic, protest against the profanation of the word friend, 
In this my history I must be honest, make a distinction 
between the oriental diamond and its worthless imitation of 
paste, and separate the grain from the chaff — gossamer 
words, that weigh nothing, from substantial realities heavier 
than gold. With heartfelt reluctance I parted with Darvell, 
and it is painful for me now to dismiss him with so faint 
an outline as 1 have traced on this paper. 

De Ruyter having discovered the grab's bowsprit to be 
h h 2 



4>SS ADVENTURES OF 

sprung, and both vessels being in want of spars, we got 
under weigh, and went round to the bay of Bonny on the 
southern coast. In this most spacious and magnificent of 
bays we anchored close to the shore; and, after De Ruyter 
had communicated with the Rajah, who issued orders to his 
subjects, the Bonnians, not to molest nor interfere with us, 
we sent the carpenter and a party of men to select the 
timber. While De Ruyter was employed in striking his 
masts and unshipping his bowsprit, we overhauled the 
schooner's rigging, and set about destroying the rats and 
other vermin; which, by the by (I mean the rats), in some 
measure compensated for the damage they had done to the 
ship and provisions, by furnishing, in their own persons, 
to hungry mariners, a not unpalatable relish, besides many 
an hour's excellent sport, in which we used to hunt and 
spear them. At one period, I remember, we had run so 
short of provisions, and what we had was so salt, hard, and 
unsavoury, that the price of a brace of rats on board of us 
rose to a quarter dollar; while the Borneo breed, long bodied, 
short legged, round quartered, sleek skinned, and fine eared, 
were readily disposed of at a fraction more. When skinned, 
split open, sprinkled with pepper and salt, and nicely 
broiled, they furnish a salubrious and piquant relish for 
breakfast. The hind quarters were then as exquisite to my 
palate, as the thighs of woodcocks, and the tainted haun- 
ches of venison, are to shore-going grand gourmands. But 
the daintiest viands soonest pall on the palate ; I had been 
surfeited with turtle, and, revelling on the bountiful sup- 
plies we got from the shore, rat-diet became nauseous, and 
we cleared out the schooner to be rid of them — centipedes, 
scorpions cockroaches, and other intruders. Doctor Van 
Scolpvelt provided a villanous composition, the smoking 
fumes of which, he averred, would smother all the devils 
in hell, if he could hermetically seal its gates. We distri- 
buted this kill-devil hell-paste in several parts of the vessel, 
ignited it, and battened down the hatchways, destroying, 
Ci at one feel swoop/' all the reptiles which infested and an- 
noyed us. This, and clearing and restoring the schooner's 
hull and rigging to that nice order on which sailors pride 
themselves — for no eve is so fastidious and critical as a 



A YOUNGER SON. 4:dQ 

sailor's — stowing the holds, cutting wood, getting water, 
sending the sick on shore, repairing the sails and casks, 
setting up the standing rigging, and other matters, kept all 
hands at work for a considerable time. 

While this was going on I made frequent excursions on 
shore, and maintained a friendly intercourse with the 
Bonnians, who, next to the warlike Malays, were the people 
I best liked ; they were friendly, frank, hospitable, honest, 
enterprising, and brave. The Dutch policy here was the 
same as that employed by the English on the continent of 
India — the exciting and fomenting intestine wars among 
the native princes, in order to secure and augment their 
own possessions; besides, on the part of the Dutch, reaping 
the collateral, and, indeed, principal advantage of being fur- 
nished with the prisoners of war for slaves, whom they 
exported to Java and the spice-islands. In other respects 
their settlement on this island was convenient, as maintaining 
open a line of communication with their other residencies 
in the East. In the great bay of Bonny there was a fine 
river, leading to a large lake in the interior, which the 
Rajah wisely forbad the Europeans from surveying, well 
knowing the covetousness of their eyes, as he said, was only 
10 be exceeded by the rapacity of their hands. 

In one of my excursions around the great bay, I had pro- 
vided myself with a sean for fishing, and weapons for the 
chase. As we were pulling along the shore of the south- 
ernmost point, we opened, through a somewhat narrow 
entrance, to a smaller bay. It was perfectly calm, but the 
ground- swell rolled in heavily, and we heard the surf 
breaking on the shelving-beach at its extremity or bottom; 
above which arose a small, but rocky and rugged hill, bare 
on the sides, but crowned with majestic timber and patches 
of underwood. On each side of the bay the land was high, 
broken, and shelving, with jagged and rent rocks, whose 
sharp points continued in successive lines, bearing a most 
forbidding and inhospitable aspect. The prolific and rife 
vegetation of the East appeared vainly struggling for exist- 
ence on its arid surface. Only those low and creeping 
plants thrived well, with wiry roots to insinuate themselves 
into the fissures of the hardest stone, till, swelling into 



470 ADVENTURES OF 

wedges, they break through them, and enter the hard crust 
of the earth. Around the entire margin of this bay, formed 
like a horse-shoe, was laid, I suppose by the waves, a 
carpet of the finest and smoothest sand ; its yellow surface 
here and there strewn with glittering shells, and bones 
bleached by the salt-water and the sun, but without a 
single pebble. The general transparent blueness of the 
water, indicative of its depth, and the absence of rocks and 
shoals, were the more remarkable as contrasted with the 
peculiar abruptness and ruggedness of its shores, on which 
there did not appear enough of level surface for the foun- 
dation of a fisherman's co£, nor were there any signs of 
human habitation. 

Impressed with the idea that this bay must be an ex- 
cellent place to haul the sean in, I determined to try it ; 
and putting the helm up, impelled by the swell, we ran the 
boat directly in. I luffed to, about midway down, and, 
running the boat, on the weather or sea- side, slap on the 
beach, the sides of which were nearly as steep as a wash- 
ing-basin, we landed our tackle, and a small tent I always 
carried with me for Zela. We again launched the boat 
with the sean, the men pulling deeper into the bay for a 
shallower and more favourable place for hauling it. Zela 
and myself strolled along the beach, collecting specimens of 
the finest shells I had seen. On the first cast of the sean, 
near the bottom of the bay, where the water was shallow, 
and the tide just turned, coming in, we had the heaviest 
haul of fish I ever saw or heard of, and of the most varied 
and finest kind. We literally heaped them up on the 
beach like hay-cocks ; and continued, in sheer wantonness, 
to cast and draw, so highly were the men excited, till our 
eyes became satiated. In spite of the truism that the eye 
is a thousand times more insatiable than the mouth, for we 
had no more than seven mouths to fill, we toiled on, 
robbing the ocean of enough to cram the maws of a famished 
fleet. At last the greediest imagination was surfeited ; and 
every man selecting what he thought it possible to carry, 
not eat, each bearing more than would have sufficed the 
party, we retraced our steps to where we first landed, lighted 
fires, and then man might truly have been designated a 



A LOUNGER SON. 471 

cooking animal, for all were cooks. The sportsman's brag, 
that he don't toil to fill the pot, was here belied ; for we 
devoured the produce of our sport with a greediness that 
begot a general surfeit. 



CHAPTER XXXVIII. 



And under the caves, 

Where the shadowy waves 
Are as green as the forest night ; 

Outspeeding the shark, 

And the sword-fish dark, 
Under the ocean foam. Shelley. 



I left Zela with her Malay handmaidens, and, aided by a 
boar-spear, ascended, with one of the men, an Arab, the 
rough rocks to overlook the bay. In my youth I loved 
climbing and scrambling up rocks and mountains : now I 
seldom intrude on the dweller of a second story, and my 
greatest enemy or friend may avoid me altogether on the 
third ; so humbled is the aspiring spirit of my youth. We 
wound our way along the precipitous sides of the rude 
barrier, which encompassed us, towards the bite, or bottom 
of the bay : and, rather wearied, gained a rude and jutting 
ledge of rocks, forming a small platform, nearly half-way 
to the summit. There I seated myself, lighted my pipe, 
and looked down on the entire bay, which lay under my 
feet; and, further onwards, the bay of Bonny, which, banked 
in by the islands on the sea-side, appeared an extensive 
lake. Looking down on the water, its aspect was flat and 
unruffled : many of the picturesque proas of the natives 
were scudding in with the last of the sea-breeze. On the 
narrow strip of bright sand, which lay round the water like 
a golden frame to a dark, oval Venetian picture, lay our 
little boat, the fishing-net drawn over, and its ends spread- 
ing along the beach, like a black spider veiled in its grey 
web. ^f 

h h 4 



472 ADVENTURES OP 

My hawk-eyed Arab now pointed out to me a line of 
dark spots, moving rapidly in the water, rounding the arm 
of the sea, and entering the great bay. At first I thought 
they were canoes capsised, coming in keel uppermost ; but 
the Arab declared they were sharks, and said, u The bay is 
called Shark's Bay: and their coming in from the sea is an 
infallible sign of bad weather." A small pocket-telescope 
convinced me they were large blue sharks. I counted eight; 
their fins and sharp backs were out of the water. After 
sailing majestically up the great bay till they came opposite 
the mouth of a smaller one, they turned towards it in a 
regular line; one, the largest I had seen any where, taking 
the lead, like an admiral. He had attained the entrance, 
with the other seven following, when some monster arose 
from the bottom, near the shore, where he had been lurking, 
opposed his further progress, and a conflict instantly ensued. 
The daring assailant I distinguished to be a sword-fish, or 
sea-unicorn, the knight-errant of the sea, attacking every 
thing in its domain ; his head is as hard and as rough as a 
rock, out of the centre of which grows horizontally an ivory 
spear, longer and far tougher than any warrior's lance : 
with this weapon he fights. The shark, with a jaw larger 
and stronger than a crocodile's, with a mouth deeper and 
more capacious, strikes also with his tail, in tremendous 
force and rapidity, enabling him to repel any sudden attack 
by confusing or stunning his foe, till he can turn on his back, 
which he is obliged to do ere he can use his mouth. This 
wily and experienced shark, not daring to turn and expose his 
more vulnerable parts to the formidable sword of his enemy, 
lashed at him with his heavy tail, as a man uses a flail, 
working the water into a syllabub. Meanwhile, in honour, 
I suppose, or in the love of fair play, his seven compatriot 
sharks stood aloof, lying to with their fins, in no degree in- 
terfering in the fray. Frequently I could observe, by the 
water's eddying in concentric ripples, that the great shark 
had sunk to the bottom, to seek refuge there, or elude his 
enemy by beating up the sand ; or, what is more probable, 
by this manoeuvre to lure the sword-fish downwards, which, 
when enraged, will blindly plunge its armed head against a 
rock, in which case its horn is broken ; or, if the bottom is 



A YOUNGER SON. 473 

soft, it becomes transfixed, and then would fall an easy prey. 
De Ruyter, while in a country vessel, had her struck by 
one of these fish (perhaps mistaking her for a whale, which, 
though of the same species, it often attacks), with such ve- 
locity and force, that its sword passed completely through 
the bow of the vessel ; and, having been broken by the 
shock, it was with great difficulty extracted. It measured 
seven feet : about one foot of it, the part attached to the 
head, was hollow, and the size of my wrist ; the remainder 
was solid, and very heavy, being indeed the exquisite ivory 
of which the eastern people manufacture their beautiful 
chess-men. But to return to our sea-combat, which con- 
tinued a long time, the shark evidently getting worsted. 
Possibly the bottom, which was clear, was favourable for 
his enemy ; whose blow, if he succeeds in striking while 
the shark is descending, is fatal > I think he had struck 
him, for the blue shark is seldom seen in shoal or discoloured 
water; yet now he floundered on towards the bottom of 
the bay, madly lashing the water into foam, and rolling and 
pitching like a vessel dismasted. For a few minutes his 
conqueror pursued him, then wheeled round and disap- 
peared; while the shark grounded himself on the sand, 
where he lay writhing and lashing the shore feebly with his 
tail. His six companions, with seeming unconcern, wore 
round, and, slowly moving down the bay, returned by the 
outlet at which they had entered. Hastening down to the 
scene of action, I saw no more of them. My boat's crew 
were assembled at the bottom of the bay, firing muskets at 
the huge monster as he lay aground ; before I could join 
them, he was despatched, and his dead carcase laid on the 
beach like a stranded vessel. Leaving him and them, I 
ran along the beach for half a mile to regain Zela's tent. 



474 ADVENTURES OP 



CHAPTER XXXIX. 

And all my knowledge is that joy is gone, 

And this thing woe crept in among our hearts, 

There to remain for ever, as I fear. Keats. 

When close upon the tent, I caught the sounds of 
moaning and wailing within. Stooping down at the 
low entrance, I saw the sand spotted with blood. I 
burst through the canvass screen, and stood motionless 
as marble ; and my heart felt as heavy and cold. My 
eyes dizzy, my senses bewildered, I gazed on what I 
thought the lifeless remains of Zela, stretched out like a 
corpse. Her black and dripping hair, in bloody and 
tangled masses, over her pallid bosom, looked like a 
dark shroud. Her eyes and mouth were half closed ; she 
was unconscious, insensible. The Malay girls knelt by 
her on each side in despair, sobbing, tearing their hair, 
and rending their garments. They made signs to me as I 
entered, but Zela absorbed every faculty. I made an 
effort to approach ; I tried to speak ; but, heart-struck, 
I staggered, and should have fallen, had I not grasped the 
stancheon which supported the tent. With my eyes fast 
riveted on Zela, I thought I saw her eyelids move ; then 
the sound of her voice thrilled through my frame, and 
recalled my fleeting faculties, though her words were in- 
articulate. Kneeling by her side, I loosened her vest, 
put my hand on her heart, and felt it moving. I pressed 
my lips to hers; they were white, but still warm with 
life. I raised her head, and rubbed her hands ; the blue 
veins on her beautiful eyelids, forehead, and neck swelled 
out, and a slight flush of crimson spread over her. She 
opened wildly her large dark eyes, reminding me forcibly 
of the first time I had encountered their magic fascination. 
i( Dearest Zela," I stammered out, (i what is the matter ? " 
She gazed on me, as if with an effort to collect her 
powers of mind, and, in her low musical voice, answered, 
slowly and distinctly, — " Nothing, love, if you are here. 



A YOUNGER SON. 4? 5 

I am well — very well. But you are ill, — you appear 
very ill." 

She then made an effort to turn on her side, but groaned 
with pain, and fell back powerless. After closing her 
eyes for a minute, she again opened them, and said, <e Oh, 
yes ! I remember I have had a fall, and hurt myself a 
little, — nothing more. Oh ! where is Adoo ? — she fell 
too, — do, dear, see to her ! I shall soon be well." 

I looked at the Malayan girl, who was supporting her 
on the opposite side. Her face and hands were streaming 
with blood; but, without wasting a thought on herself, 
she was watching Zela as eagerly as I had done. She 
dried her eyes with her hair, and her dark features bright- 
ened as her mistress gave her a look of recognition. I 
interrogated her as to Zela's hurts; she pointed to her 
head, and several parts of her body. Angry at my folly 
in having, for an instant, neglected that on which so much 
depended ; and, inspired by the overwhelming reaction of 
hope, with a hand that had never trembled till then, I 
examined her wounds. After having persuaded her to 
drink some wine and water, she in vain besought me 
(never till then in vain) to first attend to Adoo. Even 
had I consented, the true-hearted little barbarian, although 
bleeding to death, would have died uncomplainingly, ere 
she would have permitted me to stanch her blood while 
her mistress's was flowing. The wounds on Zela's body, 
head, legs, and arms were many ; yet (and I had some skill 
in surgery) they did not appear to me dangerous. Her 
insensibility had been occasioned by the blows on her 
head, and by loss of blood. There were severe bruises on 
her side and back, which gave her the greatest pain ; and 
their consequences filled me with dread. But now that 
animation was restored, and with it her presence of mind, 
she contrived to lull my fears, and strengthen my hopes. 

My attention was then directed to Adoo, at whom 
Zela shriekingly pointed. The poor little girl, whom I 
had hardly noticed, the instant her fears for her mistress 
had in some degree subsided, fell senseless on the sand. Her 
legs and one of her hands were almost cut through, and the 
sand, where she had been seated, was in a puddle from 



476 



ADVENTURES OF 



the quantity of blood she had lost. I tore the remainder 
of my shirt into bandages, stanched and bound up her 
wounds ; but, with every care, it was long ere she gave 
indications of returning life. 

The sailors had been for some time assembled round the 
tent, anxious to ascertain the fate of those within : they 
were ignorant of the circumstance, having been drawn 
down the bay watching the sharks. I went out, and 
ordered them instantly to prepare the boat for returning 
on board. The cockswain pointed to the sea, and said, — 

(C The boat can't live, sir, in such weather." 

u Weather ! — why it is a calm ! " 

I looked at the great bay, and beheld with dismay that 
one of those squalls, so frequent in tropical climates, 
had suddenly come on. Savage at this new evil, and the 
dreadful consequences of delay, which might be fatal to 
Zela, I ran to the point v and, ascending the rocks, the first 
blast of the gale, which caught me, would have borne me 
over them, had I not held on with my hand. It was 
blowing a complete hurricane — the sun had disappeared 
in the gloom — night prematurely was setting in — the 
sky was black and lowering, and the sea was an entire 
sheet of foam. 

It did not require an instant's thought as to the total 
impossibility of venturing out in such weather. The 
clouds too seemed surcharged with thunder and water ; I 
therefore hastened back with the men, and we all turned 
to, hauling the boat up high and dry, and securing the 
tent by every possible means. The boat-sails and tackle 
were added — the sand was channelled all round — rocks 
were placed on the tent-pegs, and dry wood collected for 
firing. Luckily, we bad a keg of water and bread in the 
boat, with some other necessaries I never left the ship with- 
out, and, what was of the utmost importance, a lantern. 
With the darkness the storm increased, and, in eddying 
gusts roared up the bay with a force that seemed to rock 
the hills. 

During the night we were all kept on the alert, first 
to prevent the tent from being blown away, and then 
from being washed into the sea by the floods or rain 



A YOUNGER SON. 4? 7 

which followed. So loud and continued was the thunder, 
reverberating among the hills, that it was like the deafen- 
ing explosions when rocks are blasted in a tunnel, or in a 
deep mine. As I walked to and fro on the beach, in me- 
lancholy forebodings, I wished the lightning would rend 
the rocks on each side, till, crumbling down, they filled up 
the bay beneath, and buried us all together. The invo- 
cation I made then, I have never revoked : would that it 
had been accomplished ! 



CHAPTER XL. 

Thy cheek is pale 
For one whose cheek is pale : thou dost bewail 
His tears who weeps for thee. * * * 
* * * * 'Tis she ; but, lo ! 
How changed, how full of ache, how gone in woe! Keats. 

The rain having lulled the wind, to keep Zela as much as 
possible from the wet sand, I sat down, leaning against the 
tent-pole, and supported her in my arms. On the morn- 
ing I learnt the following particulars. She said — 

" Two hours after your departure — Oh, would you had 
never left me ! for I feel it is not your fate that hangs on 
me, as you have often told me, but mine on yours ! Why, 
then, did you not let me go with you to the mountain ? 
You have seen me climb, and have said nothing but the 
lizard could follow me." 

I answered, i( Yes, but remember you were then as 
light as a bird ; now your weight is increased by the bur- 
then you have within you. Our first child prematurely 
lost its life by your rash exertions in saving its father/' 

" Could I hesitate to sacrifice my child to rescue its 
father ? A child's life, weighed in the balance by a wife's 
hand, is but a feather against the heavy loss of a husband. 
Besides, who, that is an orphan, would willingly bring 



478 ADVENTURES OF 

into this cruel world a being so helpless and wretched as 
itself?" S 

After giving vent to her feelings, she proceeded to sa- 
tisfy my first inquiries regarding her present situation, and 
said, cc I strolled along the beach to the point of rocks at 
the entrance of the bay, and, coming to a sheltered and 
shady place, I determined to bathe with Adoo,— the water 
looked so smooth and cool. The other little girl was 
posted to prevent intrusion. Then, knowing you admire 
the coral trees, which grow under the water, and seeing 
some very beautiful ones, I told Adoo to dive and bring 
me up a branch. It was of the deep crimson, which you 
said was the best. Owing to its brittleness, it was a long 
time before we could get an entire one. While we were 
still looking about, we heard a great noise in the water 
near us ; and Adoo, who, you know, has good eyes, saw 
something coming in from the sea, and told me there were 
benetas jumping about in play, a sign of bad weather -at 
hand. She then told me she saw you coming along the 
beach, and added, e I can swim better than you, and will 
be the first on shore to welcome him.' 

" She swam faster than a fish, and I scolded her for her 
ill-natured exertions to shame her mistress, for I had 
vowed to be the first on land. She continued to jeer and 
mock me, until she landed on a rock, difficult to ascend, 
high out of the water, and slippery with weeds and moss. 
At that instant I heard the other girl, whom I had left as 
sentinel, shriek out, — ' Sharks! — sharks !' I thought she 
was bantering, and was still hesitating, when I knew by 
her face she spoke the truth, and endeavoured to get up 
as Adoo had done. She stood on the verge of a ledge of 
rocks. The loud flapping of the sharks was behind me, 
and I heard the seamen shouting. Adoo stooped down, 
and gave me her hand ; hastily I caught hold of it, and 
tried, with all my strength, to climb up. Adoo held my 
right hand ; with my left I seized on some sea-weed. My 
alarm added to my weight, already too heavy to be sup- 
ported by such helps, and the sea- weeds gave way. Adoo 
would not let me go, nor could her feet cling to the slimy 
sea-grass, so that we both fell. Yet she did not fall upon 



A YOUNGER SON". 4? 9 

me, or I must have then died ; — poor girl ! she threw 
herself headlong on the low rocks, and I fell on my side. 
The coral rocks are sharp, and I must have lain there, had 
not Adoo and her companion got me out of the water, — 
I know not how. 1 knew nothing more till I awoke, and 
found myself here in great pain. Then you came ; and 
since that I have been better, much better ! " 

Continuing to repeat ec much better ! " Zela sunk into 
a restless sleep, exhausted by loss of blood and intense 
pain. I knew, by experience, that such unquiet slumbers 
is not refreshment ; it is but depriving us of the conscious- 
ness of where and how we are afflicted. The brain is then 
crowded with horrid shapes and imagined tortures, far 
worse than realities, such as the most cunning of human 
tyrants could never devise. I sponged the dewy drops 
from her throbbing temples ; her groans smote my heart. 
It was evident that the internal injuries she had received 
were worse than I had apprehended ; exterior wounds 
could not so convulse her. Gloomy forebodings filled my 
mind, and almost tempted me to antedate, what I dared 
not contemplate, her loss, by ending my fears at once, 
and our lives together. My pistols lay by my side, and 
my eyes were fixed on them, when one of the seamen 
came to the door of the tent, and told me the squall had 
blown over, and the weather was clearing. 

We waited another hour for the swell to be moderate, 
during which time we made the boat as commodious 
as possible. The tent was struck, and, every thing 
being in readiness, I carried Zela on board ; and after- 
wards Adoo, who would allow no one to touch her 
but myself. The men, to show they felt for one who 
never spoke but in kindness, and never appeared amongst 
them but to confer some favour, exerted their utmost 
strength at the oars to expedite our passage. Still the 
waves were rolling in heavily from the sea ; but that was 
in our favour ; and the boat, constructed for whale-fish- 
ing, floated lightly, and moved almost as rapidly as a sea- 
swallow ; though, at that time, I did not think so. I re- 
lieved the men alternately at the oars ; and my intense 
anxiety and impatience was assuaged by physical labour. 



489 ADVENTURES OF 

We pulled the distance, which was little less than three 
leagues, within two hours. The grab's deck was crowded 
as we flew past her ; the men perceived by our rapidity 
that something had happened, and .De Ruyter inquired 
what was the matter. Without replying to his question, 
I begged he would lose no time in coming on board the 
schooner with the doctor. In the schooner also I saw the 
men ranged along the gangway ; and, in another instant, 
we shot up along-side of her. A chair was soon slung, 
lowered from the main-yard into the boat, and Zela was 
hoisted on the deck. Without speaking a word, — indeed I 
could hardly distinguish the features of the crowd of 
familiar faces gazing on us, — I bore her directly into the 
cabin. 

The doctor and De Ruyter were quickly on board. 
When they entered the cabin and beheld the change which 
four and twenty hours had made in Zela's beautiful face 
and form, De Ruyter, involuntary shuddering, closed his 
eyes, and pressed his hands over his face ; while the 
hitherto impenetrable doctor, who, except on hearing of 
Louis' death, had never shown the least sympathy with 
human woe, now took the glasses from his eyes, and wiped 
them. Then, with a tenderness foreign to his usual prac 
tice, he proceeded to unbind and examine the wounds of 
his gentle patient. Not a question was asked by either of 
them ; and, during the whole process, no other words were 
spoken than the brief account I was compelled to give for 
the instruction and guidance of the doctor. 

The most learned in human physiognomy might have 
gazed for ever on Van's unchanging features without a 
chance of reading his thoughts. After dressing her 
wounds, he carefully examined the bruises on her body, 
and, giving her a preparation of opium, left her. I fol- 
lowed, and warmly essayed to fathom his thoughts. He 
was struck by the alteration in my bearing towards him ; 
for, when suffering in my own person from wounds cr 
sickness, I had still maintained my bantering and jeering 
manner, and often vexed him beyond endurance. But 
now my pride was humbled ; for I had faith in Van's 
skill, on which all my hopes depended, and was meek, and 



A YOUNGER SON. 481 

obedient as the most abject slave to the most imperious 
and powerful of masters. It is almost needless to say 
that the poor faithful attendant, Adoo, lacked little of the 
care that was bestowed on her mistress. She was laid on 
the opposite couch ; and it was evident her strength was 
greater, or her sufferings infinitely less acute; for her 
features had undergone but a slight and nearly impercep- 
tible change, whilst Zela's were so contracted by spasms, 
that she was scarcely to be recognised. 



CHAPTER XLI. 



Thy voice was a sweet tremble in mine ear, 

Made tuneable by every sweetest vow, 

And those sad eyes were spiritual and clear ? 

How changed thou art ! how pallid, chill, and drear ! Keats. 

Save thine, <s incomparable oil," Macassar .' Byron. 

After watching Zela till she slept, I went on deck, where 
I found De Ruyter waiting for me. I gave him a de- 
tailed account of all that had led to this fatal calamity; for 
I could not divest myself of a conviction that it would ter- 
minate fatally. His arguments to the contrary, although 
they were rational and wise, could not shake my belief. 
Firmly fixed was the presentiment that the spring-tide, 
which had borne me on triumphantly to the attainment of 
perfect happiness, was turned, ebbing back to the sea, and 
that mine and my happiness would be left a stranded 
wreck. To relax the tense chords, strainingly drawn from 
heart to brain, De Ruyter endeavoured to divert my 
thoughts to the discussion of other topics. He told me he 
had, on the previous evening, received intelligence, coming 
through an infallible channel, that the Governor-general of 
India had, at length, determined on fitting out an expedi- 
tion (with the details of which he was in possession), for 
the wresting of the Isle of France out of the hands of the 
French. 

Ci It has been made known to me," said De Ruyter, 
i r 



482 



ADVENTURES OP 



" through my correspondent, an Armenian merchant, who 
resides at the seat of government, and has found means of 
diving to the very bottom of every council held there. 
This enterprise has been long, very long, in contemplation ; 
but now they have resolved to carry it into execution. 
This will materially alter my plans. We have no time to 
lose ; we must exert ourselves to the utmost in expediting 
the refitment and equipment of our vessels." 

At another time this would have aroused me, had I been 
bed-ridden with a jungle-fever ; but now, in the most 
animating part of his discourse, while detailing the naval 
and military force to be employed, and the names of their 
respective commanders, a death-like torpor, which had 
stolen up my limbs, and weighed on my body like lead, at 
length ascended to my eyelids, which it sealed, and I fell 
into the profoundest sleep I can remember. De Ruyter, 
as I afterwards discovered, had carefully covered me with 
flags, and placed a sentinel over me to prevent my being 
disturbed. Since Zela's accident, I had not taken food ; 
and De Ruyter artfully induced me to drink a cup of 
strong coffee, under the plea of keeping me awake. This 
he had drugged with opium, to enforce that rest, without 
which he foresaw my strength of body and mind would be 
prostrated. I did not awake till the evening, and won- 
dered how I could have enjoyed such a long and undis- 
turbed sleep at such a time. 

I hastily descended to the cabin, and found the doctor 
examining his patients. They were both sitting up, sup- 
ported by cushions. The Malay girl was considerably 
better, but Zela's mind only seemed to have benefited; 
her bodily sufferings had undergone no change. Her face, 
which before was rosy, bright, and pure as the first tints 
of morning, was now shaded with the dim hue of sickness : 
her eyes were dull, and her lips without colour. De 
Ruyter and the doctor remained on board us during the 
wearisome night, the greater part of which I passed in the 
cabin, supporting Zela in my arms, where alone she seemed 
to find relief. 

The next day, in compliance with De Ruyter's wish to 
prepare for sea, I returned to my duties. He kindly 



A YOUNGER SON. 483 

offered to relieve me from them ; but I mechanically re- 
sumed my business, as formerly, and active employment 
was of the utmost service in preserving the strength of my 
body, which otherwise would have sunk under the weight 
of my tortured mind. No longer, as before, was I above 
fate and circumstance, therefore happy ; but full of evil 
forebodings. My heart was swollen by painful emotions, 
rendered still more trying by the necessity of repressing 
them. On the third day, when Zela's sufferings became so 
gnawingly acute as to threaten a speedy termination, 
scarcely was I sensible; I possessed only a half kind of 
feeling that death was a most desirable end; and when 
those violent throes and writhings ceased to convulse her 
frame, when she sunk into a helpless, senseless torpor, 
when she lay so motionless that I thought she was dead, I 
stood over her with a fierce firmness, startling the iron- 
nerved doctor, and exclaimed, " She is then dead ! " 

Van was then holding her tiny wrist between his gaunt 
finger and thumb, and answered, " You are ignorant. She 
lives. The crisis of" her danger is past. She is no more 
dead than I am ; she is asleep." 

His words were as balsamic oil. The stern, the painful 
rigidity of fortitude, to which I had worked myself, re- 
laxed into softness, with the same feeling of composure, as 
when our fibres are released from the grasp of a spasm, 
and are lulled into repose ; and such was the relief Zela 
then experienced. Satisfied with the truth of this, I went 
on deck as one revived, and beheld the scene shining beau- 
tifully under that magic light, in which it is the privilege 
of joy to clothe the world. My spirits became, as it were, 
embalmed in bliss. I hastened on board the grab to com- 
municate my happiness to De Ruyter and the old Rais. 
Every man participated in my joy for the restoration of 
her, whose kindness, courage, and gentleness had pene- 
trated the breasts of the roughest, and impressed their 
stubborn hearts with admiration. 

Once more was I alert in my duty, no longer an indif- 
ferent spectator. The news De Ruyter had heard he now 
retold me ; and, having completed our repairs, we weighed 
our anchors and put to sea. The Rajah, with whom De 
i i 2 



4S4t ADVENTURES OF 

Ruyter was on friendly footing, gave him, at taking leave, 
a large quantity of different oils and balsams, for which 
this island is as celebrated as Java for its poisons. Among 
the rest was a large proportion of kiapootee and colalava 
oil, and the oleaginous extract from a fruit-tree, since that 
period become so notorious in Europe (by name I mean) — 
Macassar oil. I may mention here that it was some of 
this very oil, given by the Rajah to medicine Zela's hurts, 
that, on my return to England, through the means of a 
servant, found its way into the hands of a perfumer; it 
was a quart bottle, and must have possessed the miraculous 
properties of the widow's cruise of oil. Certainly the pure 
vegetable, gelatinous oils of this island and the Moluccas 
are beneficial both to the skin and hair ; for the natives, in 
the two essential articles of beauty, surpass all the world, 
and retain them even in extreme age. Indeed, I never re- 
member to have there seen grey hair or bald heads ; and 
even the aged retain their suppleness of limb and softness 
of skin. This I should have attributed to their fine cli- 
mate, simplicity of diet, and abstinence from ardent spirits, 
were it not that many other nations participate in these 
advantages, without enjoying the same results ; therefore I 
think their balsamic oils must possess a rare virtue. The 
bald head of Socrates may have added dignity to his ap- 
pearance ; but the bald cocoa-nut shaped skulls of modern 
mortals are disgusting, and to them I ccmmend the liberal 
use of the oil of Macassar — if they can get it. 

In this voyage, De Ruyter's object being exclusively to 
return, as speedily as possible, to the Isle of France, it was 
determined not to run out of our course, nor be diverted 
from our main design, either by putting into any one of 
the islands near which we might pass, or by giving chase 
to any vessel except such as were steering in the same di- 
rection. In passing the straits of Sunda, De Ruyter ran 
in near enough to communicate with the shore by a boat, 
but did not anchor. He had an interview with the 
governor, General Jan sens, at Batavia, and received a con- 
firmation of the news he had heard at the Celebes. Taking 
in a few boat-loads of fresh provisions, we forthwith pro- 
ceeded on our voyage. De Ruyter's wish was, in our long 



A YOUNGER SON. 485 

run across the Indian ocean, from the straits of Sunda to 
the Isle of France, that we should make the best of our 
way, without the detention of keeping together. Besides,, 
as accidents might happen to one of us, either by falling in 
with English men-of-war (for intelligence had reached us 
that a squadron of frigates was in those seas, bound, as was 
conjectured, for the Isle of France), er by squalls, or 
calms, or by one of the thousand disasters attendant on a 
long voyage, the risk would be lessened by our holding dif- 
ferent courses, as then one of us might be calculated on to 
reach his destination, on which the fate of the French set- 
tlement seemed to hang. For this purpose 1 had been 
furnished with duplicates of the despatches, with full 
power to act in De Ruyter's name in his own particular 
affairs. But all these prudent and wise considerations 
were overruled by my anxiety, indeed by the urgent neces- 
sity for Doctor Van Scolpvelt's attendance on Zela, who 
continued in such a state of debility that it was still doubt- 
ful if she would not sink under it. Van's skill had tri- 
umphed at a moment of the utmost peril ; in saving her 
life he had bound me to him for ever ; his medical know- 
ledge, that had been heretofore so lightly thought of by 
me, I now reverenced as a superhuman attribute, belonging 
to him alone. It was therefore fixed that we should, run- 
ning all chances, keep together ; except in the event of our 
being pursued by an enemy of superior force, when it 
would be indispensable for us to separate and make our 
escape. 



CHAPTER XLII. 

O vulture witch, hast thou never heard of mercy? 

Could not thy harshest vengeance be contents 

But thou must nip this tender innocent 

Because I loved her ? Keats. 

So, at last, 
This nail is in my temple ! Keats' MS. 

Ordinary events during a voyage do not bear relating. 
A man might as well seek to be amused by perusing a 



486 ADVENTURES OF 

merchant's ledger as a sea common-place journal. Yet, 
had it been otherwise, I must confess, such was my weak- 
ness, that I was no longer capable of attending to, much 
less of recording, the scenes, which, indeed passed before my 
eyes, but left no impression on my mind, bright and vivid 
at the moment perhaps, as the line of light shot by a star 
through the heavens at night, yet as fading and transitory; 
or like the sparkling furrow left by our vessel's deep keel 
in the dark waters, expunged as soon as made. The 
wings of my spirit would no longer bear me' up ; my 
imagination remained hovering over the sick couch of Zela; 
my mind was tinged with the melancholy hue of the 
drooping object I contemplated. Ours were no common 
ties ; she had been as a bird driven by the tempest from 
the land, that sought refuge in my bosom ; and like a 
darling bird, too delicate to be intrusted in others' hands, 
I alone fostered and cherished her. Still the doctor, di- 
viding his time between the two vessels, continued to pre- 
dict her ultimate restoration to health ; but he confessed 
the shock her delicate frame had received required time 
and care. 

We had been nearly a month at sea, and a certain 
change for the better had taken place in her constitution. 
After sitting up with her, as usual, all night, I lay slum- 
bering uneasily on the deck under the awning, my mind 
haunted by the horrible dream of the poisonous hag of 
Java, when I was awakened by Adoo, who had nearly re- 
covered from her wounds. By the agitation depicted on 
her strongly marked features, I saw that something dis- 
astrous had taken place. Before she could utter a con- 
nected sentence, I was by Zela's couch. She was writhing 
in extreme pain, and said that her stomach was burning. 
I called to the mate on deck to make a signal to the grab 
for the doctor, but she, unfortunately, was nearly out of 
sight ahead, and it was almost a calm. Questioning Adoo 
as to the cause of Zela's present state, she pointed to a jar 
on the table, and told me that, her mistress not having 
eaten any thing for a long time, she, with the other girl, 
had hunted in the store-room for something that would 
tempt her to eat. They found that jar of preserved fruit ; 



A YOUNGER SON. 487 

when her mistress, fond of sweetmeats, ate a great deal, 
and gave some to the other little girl, who was seized with 
the same pain after eating it. " Seeing my mistress liked 
it," said Adoo, " I did bnt taste one of the fruit, and it has 
made me sick. I am sure there is poison in that jar." 

The w r ord poison pierced my brain like a barbed arrow. 
Looking at the newly opened jar, which had been closed 
with more than ordinary care by a resinous gum, I emptied 
out a portion of the fruit. They were a very fine sort of 
the wild green and yellow nutmegs, preserved in white 
sugar-candy. Had the small green snake, a native of Java, 
whose venom is the deadliest of all its tribe, erected its 
crest from out the jar, it would not so have shaken my 
nerves. For I remembered I had, at the widow's, eaten 
many preserved nutmegs from a jar, the counterpart of the 
one before me, and that they had made me sick ; when an 
old woman — a confidential slave of the widow, whose 
heart I had won by giving her a small silver box to fasten 
round the arm, containing a scrap of papyrus with a hiero- 
glyphic charm, brought from Mecca, telling her it was a 
passport to admit her, alone of all the sex, into paradise ; 
then she looked at me, long and steadily, and said, " Have 
you angered my mistress already?" I laughed at the ques- 
tion. At that moment the widow came into the room in 
high spirits, patted my cheeks, and ran away to make me 
some coffee. As soon as she was gone, the old woman 
again addressed me with, u I was going to say, if my mis- 
tress is angry, and if you have eaten nutmegs prepared by 
her hands, you had better keep to yourself the talisman, 
which is to unlock the gates of paradise. You are too 
young and too happy to go there. I once told a husband 
of my mistress the same. He was a good man, and gave 
my son his freedom. I told him not to eat nutmegs, 
when, — ah ! — when — " 

" And why not ? " I inquired. 

"He asked me the same question," replied the old 
woman. "But you men are ail infidels; you believe 
nothing that women say if they are old, and, what is worse, 
every thing if they are young. My mistress saw another 
man she liked better ; and I heard her one day say bitter 
i i 4 



488 ADVENTURES OF 

things of my master. The next day I saw her give him 
those sweet things to eat, and he became sick ; when he 
was carried out of the house, and another man came in, 
and put on his slippers and turban. But I can read my 
mistress's thoughts ; as yet she loves you, and will do you 
no harm. So I shall keep the charm, for I shall want it 
soon ; but mind you do not make my mistress angry, for 
then she is deadly as the poison of the cheetic-tree, which 
grows in the jungle, on which the sun never shines." 

Our conversation was again interrupted by the widow, 
and half a dozen slaves bringing coffee and cold water. 
This warning made some impression at the time, for I de- 
sisted from eating the most delicious sweatmeats in the 
world ; and it had been strengthened, before I left the 
island, by many corroborating stories from others. Often 
had I afterwards congratulated myself on escaping from 
her fangs, when sweltering with venom. Now the fright- 
ful belief flashed on my mind, that the cunning strumpet, 
aided by the devil himself, had, as it were, stretched her 
arm across the Indian ocean to ship the poisoned jar ; for 
by no investigation could I ascertain how or when it came 
on board. 

While I stood pondering over the accursed fruit, half 
unconscious where I was,, I thought I could hear the fiend- 
ish laugh of the widow mocking me, I thought I could 
see her, as she stood in the stern of the boat, threatening 
and cursing me as I left the harbour of Batavia, and began 
to repay her with loud and savage imprecations, till Zela, 
alarmed at my looks and gestures, believing me mad, forgot 
for a moment her own agony, took hold of my hand, pulled 
me on the bed, and soothed me with the softest accents, 
assuring me she was getting better. She bade me lay my 
head on her bosom, and she would rub it, for she saw the 
veins were distended on it. She said, almost playfully, 
(£ I can bear any pain but that of seeing you suffer. Your 
looks, my love, affright me. Take this fruit," (giving me 
a pomegranate,) " which the poet Haflz calls the pearl of 
fruits ; and thus I imitate the example of the shell of the 
ocean, to fill with pearls the hand which wounds it." 

The calmness with which she talked deceived me for a 



A YOUNGER SON. 489 

moment : but this effort of her mind almost destroyed her 
frail body ; for then she talked wildly and incoherently, the 
subversion of her intellect foretelling the fatal issue that 
was at hand. Every muscle and nerve was writhing, as 
with a separate agony ; her features were distorted ; and 
in vain I tried every method I could think of to alleviate 
her pain. The poison was working on her vitals, and her 
mental derangement was a relief. 

When at last the doctor came and saw her, it was evi- 
dent that even his science could not avail. He examined 
the jar, compared the symptoms of his patients, and con- 
fessed that my suspicions were well grounded. But I am 
totally unequal to the task of narrating, step by step, the 
ravages that the venom worked on her. She wasted, day 
by day, till she became almost a shadow. I never left her; 
and in her lucid intervals, which were few, she clung to me 
with more than her wonted fondness ; and we mingled our 
tears, renewing our vows never to part. The truest words 
of the poet are, ei The love which is born of sorrow, like 
it, is true." Sorrow was the parent of our attachment. I 
remembered she once said to me, when revelling in health 
and happiness at our hut in Borneo, u I saw you enter the 
tent where I was a prisoner. All others fled. It was the 
house of death. You- came, like an angel, to save. Though 
you could not save my father, you avenged and consoled 
him when dying. How then could I but admire you ? 
When afterwards you attached yourself to me (by what 
charm influenced I am yet to learn), my admiration was, 
on the instant, love : for you approached me, and offered 
those sympathies which are the smaller links of that in- 
visible chain love delights to wear for ever ; because our 
senses, says Hafiz, wait upon our imagination like the most 
submissive slaves." 

My God ! how shall I find words to tell the death of her 
who had felt and spoken thus ? If all were concentrated 
into one word, that could express my feelings, to give it 
utterance would destroy my reason. 

Picking the seeds from a pomegranate, and making ruby- 
coloured letters on the bed, such as, in our happier days, 
had been the means of conveying our ideas when ignorant 



4£0 ADVENTURES OF 

of each other's language, and singing fragments of Arabian 
songs, were now her constant habits. One night she was 
startled, in the midst of her wild notes, by a voice from 
the deck calling out that the Isle of France was in sight. 
She screamed out, u I am glad of it, very glad, dearest 
husband. Only, love, take me in your arms to carry me 
on shore ; I am too weak to walk." Then throwing 
herself, with her last collected strength, into my arms, 
as I knelt by her low couch, she clasped me round the 
neck with her thin hands, and saying, — " Now I am 
well and happy! I live in his heart!" — with her lips 
pressed to mine, she yielded up her mortality ! 



CHAPTER XLIII. 

Upon those pallid lips, 
So sweet even in their silence ; on those eyes 
That image sleep in death ; upon that form 
Yet safe from the worm's outrage j let no tear 
Be shed — not even in thought. Shelley. 

Now let me borrow, 
For moments few, a temperament as stern 
As Pluto's sceptre, that my words not burn 
These uttering lips, while I in calm speech tell 
How specious heaven was changed to real hell. Keats, 

To attempt to portray what I felt then, or even now feel, 
when time and sorrow (though nothing like to this) have 
almost dried up my heart, would be indeed walking in a 
vain shadow, and disquieting myself in vain by it. The 
followers of Mahomet are tutored, from their youth, to 
suppress from the scrutiny of others all outward tokens of 
the secret counsels of the heart. In the East this is impe- 
rative as the law of self-preservation. In the West it is 
done far more effectually, if not so generally, by those who, 
a philosopher would suppose, were in derision misnamed 
noble, whose feelings, if they are impregnated with any at 
their birth (which is doubtful, considering the seed they 
spring from), are eradicated with as much care as is be- 



A YOUNGER SON. 491 

stowed in Persia on the shoots and branches of the cherry 
tree, designed for pipe-sticks, every bud that threatens to 
burst through the rind being instantly rubbed off, to pre- 
serve the smoothness and polish of the exterior. Whether 
I had lavished on Zela the last tear of sorrow, or from the 
benumbing effects which follow grief, or intense excite- 
ment, I do not know ; but a torpor came over my mind, 
encouraged by the liberal use of opium, which I then first 
learned to use, like the Chinese, by smoking it through a 
reed, and I rapidly acquired a stoical apathy of look, that 
the gravest Turk, sitting In divan, or the most stick-like 
lords, 

" Fellows of no merit, 
Slight and pufFd souls, that walk like shadows by, 
Leaving no print of what they are," 

would have envied, and despaired of imitating. De Ruy- 
ter, with all his knowledge of human nature, was perplexed 
to account for so new and strange a transition of character. 
To judge by my deportment, my years seemed trebled in a 
day. He would have thought me mad, or fast verging on 
that malady, but that all my actions demonstrated a method- 
ical regularity and precision, which I had shown no signs 
of in my days of happiness. I appeared not to mourn ; 
and I never wept, nor uttered a single complaint. My 
habits, which had before been sufficiently abstemious, occa- 
sionally dashed by extremes of the contrary, were now un- 
deviatingly such as the wisest would have applauded. The 
driest and most monotonous duties, which I had hitherto 
neglected, were now fulfilled with a scrupulous exactitude. 
What was most strange, this change took place the instant 
Zela's spirit left me. Her body was still on board. 

But let me return to my story. Having informed De 
Ruyter of my intentions regarding the remains of Zela, I 
drafted the greater portion of my men on board the grab ; 
and we then parted company. She went directly into Port 
St. Louis, and I round to Port Bourbon, on the south-east 
side of the island, where we had anchored on my first visit 
to it. De Ruyter, after delivering despatches, which he 
had brought from Java, and conferring with the governor, 
was to ride over to me, accompanied by the doctor and the 



402 ADVENTURES OF 

old Rais. I had retained on board the schooner merely 
sufficient men to work her, principally natives of the East, 
the faithful tribe of a now chieftainless house. On the 
same night I anchored in Port Bourbon. 

During the short interval that, in such a climate, inter- 
venes between death and decomposition, I had pondered 
intensely on the least repulsive mode by which it was prac- 
ticable to dispose of her remains. Death's common recep- 
tacle, the earth, naturally first engaged my thoughts ; and 
the arbour, made by our united hands, in De Ruyter's 
garden, fragrant with flowers, seemed a fitting spot. But 
as I remembered, when digging in the soil, the myriads of 
disgusting worms and beetles, I shudderingly banished that 
idea. The clear deep vault of the beautiful element which 
I loved, and floating on whose surface both of us had 
spent our lives — what could molest her there? — but my 
imagination reverted to the horrid scene that had taken 
place after Louis's interment. Then I thought I would 
have the body embalmed, and treasure it with me through 
life ; but there were so many insurmountable obstacles in 
the way, I was compelled to deny myself that consolation. 
At last I thought of the heathen ceremony of destroying 
the body by fire, or rather not destroying, but restoring it 
into its primitive state, by remingling it with the elements 
of which it is an atom. The funeral pile, the purification 
by fire; the simple, yet touching rites; the examples of the 
god-like heathen philosophers, whose bodies had been thus 
immolated ; all conspired to work on my mind, and fix my 
determination to this point. De Ruyter approved of it, 
and the doctor readily undertook to provide every thing 
necessary, and gave his assistance in the execution of what 
he was perfectly acquainted with by theory. For this 
purpose I had anchored in Port Bourbon, as the most se- 
cluded part of the island. There was no commerce there, 
and no other habitations in or near it than three or four 
paltry huts. The Dutch had, at some period, commenced 
the foundation of a town there; but it had long been totally 
abandoned, and its ruins were choked up with reeds and 
rushes. 

At the earliest dawn of day I pointed out a spot, deep 



A YOUNGER SON. 493 

in the bottom of the harbour, and sent a party of my Arab 
crew to pitch a tent, and collect a large quantity of dry 
fuel. Then, secluding myself in the cabin, I spent the 
entire day — -the last in which I could contemplate her 
who had been to me what the sun is to the earth. 

The little Malayan girl, who had partaken of the poisoned 
fruit, was still suffering from its effects. She was removed 
to another part of the vessel. Either through the strength 
of her constitution, unbroken by previous sickness, or from 
the smaller quantity she had eaten, together with the anti- 
dotes the doctor used, she not only lived, but hopes, though 
faint, were entertained of her recovery ; — I had no feeling 
left for her. Adoo had wept and moaned herself into a 
stupid insensibility ; and it was only by force she could be 
induced to take nourishment : yet I even gazed on her 
with apathy, and her sighs and groans made no more im- 
pression on me, than the wind howling amidst the shrouds 
in a gale. 

It was past midnight when my lonely contemplations 
were interrupted, by a man on deck telling me there was a 
signal from the shore. 

This was the signal, concerted with De Ruyter, to ap- 
prise me of his approach. The boats were in readiness ; 
one I sent for him and his party, and manned the long- 
boat of the grab, which he had lent me for the occasion. 
I had robed Zela in the richest costume of her country : 
her yellow vest was spangled with little rubies, and her 
chemise and flowing drawers, of sea-green Indian crape, 
were edged with gold; her outer garments were of the 
finest muslin of India ; her slippers, and the embroidered 
kerchiefs which bound up her hair, and concealed her 
bosom and the lower part of her face, were beaded and em- 
bossed with pearls. I preserved but one braid of her long, 
dark, silken hair, and, placing that in my breast, I kissed 
her eyelids, cheeks, and lips. Carefully folding her in a 
large Arab barican, or cloak of white earners hair, I con- 
veyed her into the boat. I was a mere machine. The 
blood in my veins was stagnant. I remember only that 
when De Ruyter came to me, the efforts I made to speak 
with composure had nearly stifled me. When he told me 



494? ADVENTURES OF 

they were all ready on shore, I feared I could not walk 
along the boat, yet I sternly refused to be assisted. I got 
over the boat's quarter into the sea; and, pressing my 
precious burthen closely to my breast, and warily pre- 
venting the water from touching her, I walked through the 
surf to the shore. Its coolness strengthened me, and I 
was enabled to stagger on to the spot where stood the 
funeral pile. I could recognise no other object. The 
figures that , flitted about, and those that stopped to speak 
to me, looked like spectres gliding in a dance of death. A 
black iron furnace, like a coffin, was placed on the pile. 
After standing for some time entranced at its side, my 
senses, by some means, were sufficiently restored to make 
me aware of the necessity of going through what I had un- 
dertaken. I placed the body within the iron shell as deli- 
cately as a mother lays her sleeping child in its cradle. 
Then De Ruyter, the old Rais, and others withdrew me a 
short distance away, and held me there. Oils, spices, 
musk, camphor, and ambergris, I was afterwards told, were 
thrown in by baskets full. Dry bamboos and damped 
reeds thickly covered all; so that, when ignited, I could see 
nothing but a dark, impenetrable pyramid of smoke. I 
tried to speak ; then entreated by signs, for my throat was 
* dry as death, that they would unhand me ; but they held 
me fast, and my strength had totally fled. Owing to some 
confusion, the cause of which I did not then ascertain, — 
(it was" the rescuing of Adoo, who had thrown herself 1 into 
the flames), — I found myself unfettered; and, with the in- 
tention of doing the same thing, I sprang forward, but, 
stumbling from weakness, or over some object in my way, 
I fell on the sand, so near the fire that my outstretched 
hands were severely burnt. What followed I know not, 
for I remained insensible. When restored to reason, I 
was swinging in a cot on the deck of the schooner. 

The utmost human nature can endure and survive, I 
suffered. I cursed the strength of my body, harder and 
stronger than steel, that retained, in despite of my ardent 
longing for death, the spirit of life within me. De Ruyter's 
urgent affairs kept him at the town of Port St. Louis ; but 
he frequently came over to me in the night, A small case, 



A YOUNGER SON. 49«> 

containing Zela's ashes, was given me ; it was ever near 
me. I had been strongly urged to accompany De Ruyter 
to the town, or to his country-house, but I would not leave 
the schooner 



CHAPTER XLIV. 

Am I to leave this haven of my rest, 

This cradle of my glory, this soft clime, 

This calm luxuriance of blissful light ? Keats, 

But custom maketh blind and obdurate 

The loftiest hearts ; — he had beheld the woe 

In which mankind was bound, but deem'd that fate, 

Which made them abject, would preserve them so. Shelley. 

Nearly a month had elapsed, when De Ruyter, coming 
on board one night, found me calmer and more attentive to 
his discourse than usual. He then told me he had been 
strongly urged, nay, importuned by the governor of the 
island^ to take despatches to Europe, conveying the in- 
formation he had brought ; and that information was now 
further corroborated by unquestionable authority from se- 
veral quarters. — The word Europe at first startled me ; for 
I had learnt to loathe it, and consider the East as my 
country. But now the case was altered. I wished to bid 
adieu to the objects which surrounded me. I wished to 
remove myself to the opposite extremity of the world, — I 
cared not where or how, so that I could, by action and 
change, banish thoughts, and learn to forget the past. De 
Ruyter, comprehending the workings of my mind, gave 
me time for reflection. He then asked me what I thought 
on the subject. I answered, that I was unable to think, 
and therefore could not advise ; but I told him my wishes, 
and urged him implicitly to follow his own judgment. 
<e What judgment I have," he said, " floats on the surface. 
My mind is at all times ready to answer on the instant. 
It is plain the English will be paramount in India for a 
while, and that all other European nations will be driven 
from their settlements on the Indian islands. Our stay 



496 ADVENTURES OP 

here cannot arrest the progress of events. A wise man, 
when he finds himself badly placed in one spot, will re- 
move to another. The weak and timid, like silly birds, 
drop into the jaws of the rattlesnake, I only hesitated to 
hear your wishes ; so you may prepare the schooner for 
sea ; to do which you must run her round to Port St. 
Louis. As the grab is merely adapted for the Indian seas, 
I shall sell or leave her ; and we will proceed together in 
the schooner. The business requires haste ; so you had 
better turn the hands up, and get out with this land 
breeze." 

This I did, and externally resumed the stoical fortitude 
which had left me for a time. Early on the next day I 
was at Port St. Louis, and all the busy preparations of 
going to sea for a long voyage commenced. The govern- 
ment stores, artificers, and seamen were severally put in 
requisition, by command of the governor-general, to expe- 
dite the equipment of the schooner. As I had lost all 
relish for eating and sleeping, and never left the schooner 
for an instant, at the expiration of a few days every thing 
was completed, and we lay ready to put to sea at an hour's 
notice. 

Nor did my grief make me so selfish as to forget or 
neglect these dependent on me. I consulted with Be 
Ruyter on the best means of providing for Adoo, and 
Zela's other little girl, who was still emaciated and wasting, 
and the remaining Arabs of her house, now reduced to 
twelve. He first talked with the old Rais on the subject ; 
and, with his boundless liberality, gave him the choice of 
an entire plantation on his estate on the island, as a free 
gift to him and his, without stipulation ; or money to pur- 
chase a vessel, in which he might trade as a merchant, or 
return to his country, and spend the remainder of his life 
at ease, amidst his kindred and countrymen. It would be 
a tedious recital to detail all that passed on the occasion. 
The old Arab seaman, although of the desert, had a heart 
and head that neither years nor hardships could render 
insensible. Long debating on the matter with him, Pe 
Ruyter ascertained that his wish was to return to the land 
of his fathers. It was therefore decided that Zela's Arabs 



A YOUNGER SON". 497 

and her two attendants should return with him. The 
Arabs were, by their own election, to become the followers 
of the Rais ; and the Malayan girls were to be formally 
adopted by him. 

It is scarcely necessary to say that every individual was 
amply rewarded, nor were their deserts so much considered 
as their fidelity to their mistress. Had their avarice been 
as great as that of priests, my prodigal gifts must have sa- 
tisfied them ; if indeed the insatiable maws of priests can 
ever be glutted, while aught remains to be extorted. But 
with these simple-hearted people, whatever other vices 
they may have had, avarice, the worst of all, though it 
had entered their dark bosoms, had not usurped the first 
place there. For the loss of the last blood of their race, 
the utter extinction of one of the purest Arabian tribes, 
whose pedigree went back to thousands of years, to the 
fathers of the human race, they gave vent to their grief in 
loud and clamorous yells ; whilst I, " a cannibal of my 
own heart," nourished mine in silence. 

I well knew it would be in vain to reason with Adoo on 
the necessity of her leaving me ; and it required all the 
influence Be Ruyter had over me to induce me to be 
separated from this last link connecting me with the past. 
But his reasons were so many and unanswerable, that at 
length I was compelled to submit, and he undertook to 
effect our separation by stratagem. Although I continued 
to protest strongly and urgently against this, to my sorrow 
it took place ; and its sad result filled my cup of misery 
to overflowing, and, like a poisonous oil, it floats on the 
surface. 

The eastern portion of our crew was discharged, the 
grab was sold, and the Europeans on board of her were 
transhipped to the schooner. We had no difficulty in 
completing our number of hands, as so many seamen were 
anxious to return to their country. De Ruyter provided 
for his eldest followers in various modes ; some were re- 
warded by gifts of land on his estate, a portion of which 
he disposed of, including the house ; and he took care ta 
register the freedom of those whom he had emancipated. 

At any other time the metamorphosis my body was 

K K 



498 ADVENTURES OF 

compelled to undergo, not from the caterpillar to the 
winged butterfly, but from the butterfly to the caterpillar, 
would have mortified me. In short, I laid aside the free, 
graceful, and pleasant garb of the East for the detestable 
and ludicrous fashion of the West. I would rather my 
legs were in the stocks, than my throat. The chains of a 
galley-slave do not cramp a man's limbs more than buck- 
ram, starch, and the modern tightness of dress. My first 
transition to a sailor's jacket and trowsers I could have 
borne uncomplainingly, had it ended there. 



CHAPTER XLV. 

A little shadow, floating near the shore, 

Caught the impatient wandering of his gaze ; 

It had been long abandoned, for its sides 

Gaped wide with many a rift, and its frail joints 

Swayed with the undulations of the tide. Shelley". 

It was a year afterwards that I received the afflicting news 
of Adoo. When she discovered that the schooner, bearing 
the ashes of her mistress, had left the port, contrary to her 
usual habits, but with the cunning and inflexible deter- 
mination of her nature, she listened to all the kind-hearted 
Rais could say to soothe her ; and appearing, if not satis- 
fied, yet resigned to circumstances, she succeeded in lulling 
her adopted father's suspicions. Then stealing out at night, 
she swam to a country vessel ; and, casting off the painter 
by which her boat was secured, with the rope held be- 
tween her teeth, she floated out of the harbour with the 
land-wind. When she believed herself safe from discovery 
she got on board the boat, and paddled directly out to sea, 
her mind bent on the single object of escape, evidently in 
the vain hope of overtaking the schooner. She had never, 
perhaps, reflected on its folly ; as to the danger, where her 
affections were thither was she impelled, and no impedi- 
ment could arrest her steps. 

The Rais, aware of her flight in the morning, with 



A YOUNGER SON. 499 

great sagacity traced her to having taken the boat of the 
Arab vessel; and, without a moment's delay, engaged a 
large boat, manned her with his Arabs, proceeded a long 
way to sea in our track, and cruised about for two days, 
in hopes of falling in with her. But not succeeding, he 
carefully marked the setting of the swell and currents since 
the night of her escape, ran back to the island, and 
coasted along its east side, questioning the people in the 
fishing-boats and those on shore, but without avail. There 
are two small islands at the eastern extremity of the Isle 
of France, called Round Islands ; when, going on towards 
one of these, he discovered a small boat, which proved to 
be the one taken from the Arab vessel. She was bilged, 
filled with water, and lying on the rocks, on which the 
swell of the breakers had washed and left her. The island 
was without fresh water or inhabitants ; every spot, rock, 
and hollow crevice in it were examined, without dis- 
covering the slightest vestige of Adoo. The neighbouring 
islandand the coast immediately adjoining were also searched. 
Her death seemed certain ; but the manner of it was, and 
is, involved in mystery. 

This news I felt as a sword thrust through my body, or 
as a probe forced into a newly cicatrised wound. It showed 
at least that a portion of the sensibility of my fieart was 
restored. This event, of which I could not help thinking 
De Ruyter was the origin, formed the only instance where 
I ever had to repent the having yielded up my strong im- 
pulses to his sound judgment. Henceforth I determined, 
that whatever manacles might bind my limbs, no fetters 
should incarcerate my mind. 

" I have lived thus many years, 
And run through all these follies men call fortunes, 
Yet never fixed on any good and constant 
But what I made myself : why should I grieve then 
At what I may mould any way ? " 

I cannot recal an event worth recording previously to 
our departure from the Isle of France, nor during our pas- 
sage to Europe. More than once we were chased; but 
few vessels that ever floated could keep way with the 
schooner in any weather. In the English Channel the 
British cruisers lay around us like the coral islands in the 

K K 2 



500 ADVENTURES OF 

Sooloo archipelago ; we had escaped the peril of the one* 
so we managed to elude the pursuit of the other. After 
an unprecedented quick passage we anchored in the port of 
St, Malo in France* then full of French privateers and 
ships of war. 

Ere we had been an hour at anchor De Ruyter was 
posting on his road to Paris* to deliver his despatches to 
the government* whilst I remained in charge of the 
schooner. 

We had a small cargo of the finest tea* coffee* spices* 
and, by some accident* or other* a few tons of white crystal 
sugar. This last I mention* as, at that period* the price 
of sugar was so high in France that it was sold at an enor- 
mous profit* nearly clearing the expenses of the voyage. 
Our other East Indian produce was sold at almost an 
equally high rate ; and I saw that trade* not war* was the 
most direct and only certain road leading to wealth* though 
I was utterly indifferent to its accumulation. My senti- 
ments* changed on many things* have remained* to the 
present hour* unaltered on this head. 

The voyage* and more particularly the extreme hard- 
ships we endured* with the privations attending so long a 
run in so small a craft and many hands* all conspired* 
bracing my collapsed muscles* to keep me alive. Yet I 
w r as still very weak and emaciated ; my body was so thin 
that the skin seemed stretched to bursting over my gaunt 
and bony form ; my face was haggard and careworn to 
a degree unexampled in one so young ; — for I had hardly 
yet attained the age at which the law* as if in mockery, 
tells us we are free agents, while it heaps responsibility on 
us* and thrusts us forth to earn our bitter bread by the 
sweat of our brows* like Cain* with every man's hand 
against us* — though Cain had* literally* the world for his 
garden* while we find every spot pre-occupied. In this 
struggle for existence* each is compelled to turn his hand 
against every man. 



▲ YOUNGER SON. 501 



CHAPTER XLVI. 

Sylla was first of victors ; but our own, 

The sagest of usurpers, Cromwell, he 

Too swept off senates, while he hew'd the throne 

Down to a block. Byron. 

Look to the East, where Ganges^swarthy race 

Shall shake its usurpation to its base 

Lo ! there rebellion rears her ghastly head, 

And glares the Nemesis of native dead, 

Till Indus rolls a deep purpureal flood, 

And claims his long arrears of northern blood. 

So may ye perish ! Ibid. 

Seven or eight days had passed when De Ruyter returned 
to St. Malo. Several long conferences had passed between 
him and the French emperor. De Ruyter represented him 
as so wrapt up in schemes for aggrandising himself in 
Europe, that he afforded little attention to things out of it ; 
and he asserted that if he could monopolise the East Indian 
trade, as the English had done, he would not permit it ; 
for it could merely tend to enrich a few individuals, whilst 
it must ultimately ruin the nation at large. " And so," 
he added, " the English will find it, if they continue it on 
the same footing." 

De Ruyter answered him that he was of the same opi- 
nion ; but as the foundation of the political power of Eng- 
land was her commerce, that was the vulnerable side to be 
assailed ; and as the Isle of France, having two excellent 
ports, St. Louis and Bourbon, besides one at the Isle of 
Bourbon " 

" What ! " exclaimed Napoleon, " are the wealth and 
blood of France to be expended to maintain islands in the 
Indian Ocean, which are but idle pyramids to comme- 
morate the name of an accursed dynasty, that should be 
blotted from the page of history altogether, and for ever ? *' 
* De Ruyter, with his usual fearless frankness, observed^ 

e ' What signifies a name ? It can be " 

" A name ! " interrupted Napoleon, hurriedly, — " a 
name ! — why it is every thing ! The puny rocks, so de- 
signated, are worthless — let the English have them ! — 

KK 3 



502 ADVENTURES OP 

they will value them for the legitimacy of their appella- 
tions. Tell me, for I am referred to you on the present 
state of India, can any thing be done there ? What is 
your opinion ? We have heard of you, and your name 
is a great one ; it has long slept ; but, by report, its spirit 
lives revived in you. I will be your pioneer, and put you 
in a way to add to its greatness. You have an example/' 
he continued, after a pause, " you have an example in your 
country, Holland, that a commercial nation may rapidly 
become great; yet that is transitory, — it never has endured, 
it never can endure. A nation, to be lasting, must build 
on the foundation of its own soil. We have no difficulty 
in finding leaders for our soldiers ; look at those men 
(pointing to a regiment of his guards, drawn up outside the 
Tuilleries), there is not one among them but could, and 
many of them assuredly will, be able generals. Yet I have 
searched in vain, throughout the nation, for a single De 
Witt, De Ruyter, or Van Tromp ; else would I hasten the 
downfal of a nation, whose vaunted wooden ramparts are 
formidable only as the wall of China, while neighbouring 
nations are less powerful. Our Gallic nation are all bilious : 
this is a spur to them on shore ; but on the water they are 
sea-sick; I had been a sailor, if my liver would have al- 
lowed me. I never entered a boat but the heaving of the 
sea made me feel helpless as a puling baby. Our admirals 
are worse. I remember two of the oldest, with me at 
Boulogne, looked qualmish at merely seeing the vessels 
pitch and roll in the port. An Englishman, a twelve- 
month at sea, is sick of the shore after a week's absence. 
But our empire is on the land ; and thirty millions of men, 
in the very heart of Europe, will and must endure firm as 
the centre of the earth itself." 

Napoleon then questioned De Ruyter, in detail and mi- 
nutely, concerning the native princes of India, their 
strength, the population of their countries, their divisions 
among themselves, their religions, their revenues,, and their 
characters, and more particularly concerning their courage 
and abilities. As De Ruyter went on, he made hasty re- 
marks, in a low tone, as if indifferent to what he said 
being heard or not 



A YOUNGER SON. 503 

He concluded with, ** It is strange that the Turks and 
Chinese are the only people who, whether conquerors or 
conquered, have attained the only useful end of conquest, a 
real augmentation of their national strength. If intolerance 
and bigotry enabled them to do this, the English ought also 
to have succeeded ; for they are more intolerant and bigoted 
than either. They cannot mingle or unite themselves 
with any other people, not even with their nearest neigh- 
bours, the Scotch and the Irish. They go forth with a 
bayonet in one hand, and a halter in the other ; never, for 
a moment, will they lay them aside ; after a lapse of cen- 
turies they have not advanced a single step in men's minds 
or hearts. Therefore the end must be that the natives of 
India, from the Himmalayan mountains to the sea, with 
one voice giving vent to their long pent-up execrations, 
will arise, exterminating their haughty oppressors, and 
every record of their ignominious slavery." 

In long and repeated audiences which Be Ruyter had 
with Napoleon, the emperor, when alone with him, spoke, 
openly and unhesitatingly, his opinions ; and he was 
pleased with the equal frankness of De Ruyter, his discri- 
minating knowledge of men teaching him that he had a 
man to deal with as strong-minded as himself, not to be 
dazzled or daunted by the idle parade of a court, or the in- 
signia of arbitrary sovereignty. Napoleon was the only 
monarch that De Ruyter did not thoroughly despise, and 
him he hated for his selfish and insatiable ambition. 

" He has, indeed," said De Ruyter, u shaken some of 
the palsied old legitimate dotards from their mouldering, 
worm-eaten thrones ; and, doffing their purple robes, held 
them up to the derision of mankind. Yet, doing this, he 
vainly thought to perpetuate tyranny by substituting mili- 
tary despots, by whom he hopes to secure himself, and 
bind the ambitious by gratitude or interest, as if the am- 
bitious could feel for anything but themselves. Much 
good, on the whole, may and will ensue ; but we owe him 
nothing, for he designed nothing but evil. A rusty bolt is 
the most difficult to withdraw ; but once removed, though 
replaced, it will never hold securely. What a master's 
hand teaches his workmen for his own benefit will be, 
k k 4 



504* ADVENTURES OF 

some day, turned to their own advantage. Napoleon has 
taught our children to play the game of hocus-pocus with 
popes, priests, kings, and other straw-stuffed scarecrows ; 
they (for we, their fathers, still cling to the rocking-horse 
and rattle), despising the toys of our times, will cast them 
aside for ever, and play a manlier game/' 

De Ruyter moreover added, that the emperor had re- 
quested to see him again, hinting he should employ him^ 
and, as bounty-money, tendered him less than the value of 
a shilling — the ribbon of the legion of honour. 

" They would have disgraced me," he said, " by creat- 
ing me a chevalier — I'd rather be a Chevalier d'Industrie. 
Let us dispose of our cargo, and conclude the business 
which brought us here. I never served but one man — 
Washington ! I was then a boy. In France, during a 
part of the revolution, 1 sought to complete rny apprentice- 
ship to liberty : although, in France I found many men 
professing to teach, when I had learnt enough from my 
first master to discover they were empirics. 

u Politics apart, my dear fellow, will you act wisely, -— 
will you return to your own country ? See what changes 
have taken place in your family. They are numerous and 
wealthy. Surely some among them must be worthy of 
your love. It is foolish to wantonly estrange yourself from 
human ties ; and your health and strength are woefully 
shattered. A winter's voyage to America will destroy 
you. Try a few months in your own climate. At the ex- 
piration of that time I will return ; or, if prevented by 
events not to be foreseen, you can rejoin me in America or 
elsewhere." 

I had a great deal of difficulty in bringing my mind to 
this point, yet at last I determined on it ; but not till De 
Ruyter was leaving St. Malo. The period soon arrived ; 
most of his crew were now Americans, picked up in ex- 
change for French and other foreigners. Americans, 
which is not to be wondered at, dislike being detained in 
any country but their own. 



A YOUNGER SOrf. 505 



CHAPTER XLVII. 

" God sare the king !" and kings, 
For if he don't, I doubt if men will longer ; 
I think I hear a little bird who sings, 
The people by and by will be the stronger -, 
The veriest jade will wince whose harness wrings 
So much into the raw as quite to wrong her 
Beyond the rules of posting ; and the mob 
At last fall sick of imitating Job. Byeosj. 

For I will teach, if possible, the stones 

To rise against earth's tyrants. Never let it 

Be said, that we still truckle unto thrones ; 

But ye, our children's children ! think how we 

Show'd what things were before the world was free. Ibid. 

As England and France were then at war, De Ruyter in- 
quired into the hest means of my crossing the channel ; 
and, at St. Malo, this was no insurmountahle difficulty. 
The islands of Jersey and Guernsey, belonging to England, 
are inhabited, almost exclusively, by the French or their 
descendants; and, as they lie nearly in midchannel of the 
"broadest part of the English and French coast, the people 
are perfectly neutral in their politics. When ordinary 
communications are shut up by war, these islanders always 
contrive to keep theirs open. During the last war they 
were notorious; both governments were believed to have 
used them as channels by which they acquired inform- 
ation of each other's movements. The boatman, with 
whom I engaged to run me across, had certainly been em- 
ployed by the agents of France and England ; who had, on 
those occasions, given him a sealed pass, which he was 
directed to show if stopped by any of the king's officers, 
and which he was always obliged to return before he was 
paid. 

I am totally unable to write what I felt when the mo- 
ment arrived which was to separate me from the man I 
loved better, a thousand times, than ever before one man 
could love one another. The sun was setting, and the 
night mast have been cold, for my limbs shook, and I could 
hardly support myself. I was obliged to hold on the iron 
rail of the stone steps, leading from the quay to the boat in 



506 ADVENTURES OP 

which I was to embark. When we had descended,, to be 
in a line with the boat, I was insensible to the water, which 
worked up to my knees. Exhausted as if I had run a 
race, yet my movements were solemn as the chief mourner 
at a funeral. De Ruyter also was touched ; his bronzed 
face was of a leaden hue : though I believe he talked calmly 
and distinctly, I could not afterwards remember a word he 
had said, but, (C Farewell, my dear boy ! " Then, with an 
effort to speak more cheerfully, he added the consolatory 
words, ee In six months we meet again ! " 

His hand waved a last farewell ! My heart — I thought 
nothing more could move it — swelled to bursting ; and 
my eyelids, which, since Zela's deaths had been dry and hot, 
became moist. The heart is the organ of true wisdom, 
gifted with prophetic power ; it looks into futurity. Though 
De Ruyter 's words were, c< We shall meet again,' ' a pre- 
diction so rational to the judgment that mine could not 
gainsay it ; yet my heart, never before doubting that what 
he averred must be, now refused to register what he said — 
it added to his words, " Farewell, for ever ! " 

What could I but cling to De Ruyter ? Like one sus- 
pended over a cliff by a single rope, I held him ; and the 
feelings that overcame me at parting were as seeing that 
rope giving way, or as, with more appalling agony, a sailor 
fallen into the sea at midnight, catching the last glimpse of 
his ship, his limbs paralysed, his swelling heart bursts. I 
am one whose faith is, that love and friendship, with 
ardent natures, are like those trees of the torrid zone which 
yield fruit but once, and then die. 

On the night of our separation, De Ruyter returned to 
Paris. Not only the minds of men, but often their as- 
sociations, are visibly charactered on their outside. It is 
a mystical book, which all stare on, and many pretend to 
expound, but few are the number who comprehend it. 
Cromwell and Napoleon, in the West, were of the gifted 
few : by those means they ascended thrones. In the East, 
the only " study of mankind is man." They have no Miss 
Edgeworth, nor any of those millinering cutters-out of 
human nature into certain patterns of given rules in educa- 
tion. They do not measure men by one common standard; 



A YOUNGER SON. 50? 

but those gifted with strong sight pry into the individual 
characters of others, often with the precision and truth 
with which a chemist investigates matter. 

Napoleon, whose mind and conceptions took a wide 
range, although his actions were guided by self-interest, 
reminds us of Bacon's words — i( Wisdom for a man's self 
is a depraved thing ; it is the wisdom of rats, that will be 
sure to leave a house before it falls : it is the wisdom of the 
fox, that thrusts out the badger: and whereas they have 
all their time sacrificed to themselves, they have often, in 
the end, sacrificed themselves to the inconstancy of fortune, 
whose wings they thought, by their self-wisdom, to have 
pinioned. " Surely this is applicable to Napoleon. 

But to return to De Ruyter. The emperor, struck with 
his noble mien and extensive information, determined to 
employ him. He made him many offers — promotion in 
his navy, the command of the coast, and the marine de- 
partment bordering the English Channel — a residency in 
a West Indian island, or a return to the East. Napoleon, 
unlike legitimate kingly blockheads, not bound down in 
holy alliances to act as neighbours act — (by the by, where 
is the Holy Alliance of God's Anointed ? I was told it 
was to last for ever !) — Napoleon thought and acted for 
himself. All his proposals to De Ruyter were made in the 
first person ; and the rejection, unenvenomed by ministers, 
was not offensive. By these conferences the emperor 
learnt that De Ruyter had a spirit to be moved, but not to 
be blindly hurried on by glory and ambition. He there- 
fore gave him scope to act in his own way, bending his 
actions to bear on the designs then in hand. De Ruyter 
was at length induced to send the schooner to America 
under the charge of his mate, taking the precaution to 
change her French papers for those of America, through 
the American charge d'affaires in Paris. 

De Ruyter's first undertaking in the emperor's service 
was a secret mission to Italy. I only know its main 
design — against him profanely denominated God's Vicar, 
and the blaspheming crew who say they are moved by the 
Spirit of the Deity. Had Napoleon been sincere in his 
detestation of these vermin, and fearless in act as De 



508 ADVENTURES OF 

Ruyter, he would not have clipped their wide-spreading 
branches, merely altering their form, but have uprooted 
the huge upas extending its baneful influence far and wide, 
and destroyed it to its root for ever. Whilst, for the good 
of all mankind, De Ruyter was investigating into the means 
of this uprooting, he was struck in the back with a stiletto, 
at the dark angle of a narrow street formed by the palace 
of a cardinal. This and other circumstances were enough 
to fix the treachery on the cowardly and atrocious priests, 
whose red stockings are emblematic of their sanguinary 
nature. His presence of mind was seconded by prompti- 
tude of hand rapid as lightning, and the assassin s dagger 
was turned against his own heart with an aim that seldom 
erred. De Ruyter escaped with a slight wound, com- 
pleted his mission with increased zeal, and returned to 
Paris. 

I could then merely ascertain that soon afterwards he 
embarked at Toulon in a French corvette, went to Corsica 
and Sardinia, and thence to the coast of Barbary, in the 
Gulf of Cabes. Beating up for Tunis, they fell in with 
an English frigate. The officer of the corvette, which was 
placed under de Ruyter's control, not under his command, 
was brave as he was inflexibly headstrong. He had per- 
sisted, till the last moment, too late to correct his error, in 
maintaining that the English vessel was a corvette, and 
not, as De Ruyter averred, a frigate ; besides stinging De 
Ruyter by boasting allusions to his country, his duty, his 
reputation, and the unsullied honours of the grand and 
invincible nation. 

De Ruyter was standing in the most exposed situation, 
on the taffrail, sinking his despatches over the stern, when 
the halliards of the French ensign were shot away. He 
and the French captain were in the act of rehoisting it, 
when they were both pierced by a hundred balls from a 
broadside of cannister shot, from the frigate's carronades, 
which swept along the corvette's deck, almost clearing it. 

His body was found enveloped in the folds of the tri- 
coloured flag, under which he had fought so long victo- 
riously ; — it was then his winding-sheet. Let me borrow 
the words of a Russian poet for his eulogy and epitaph ; 



A YOUNGER SON. 509 

they are worthy of him, and far better than I can find in 
my own mind : — 

" He lived, he fought 
For truth and wisdom ; foremost of the brave, 
Him glory's idle glances dazzled not ; 
'Twas his ambition, generous and great, 
A life to life's great end to consecrate ! " 



CHAPTER XLVIII. 

A fisherman he had been in his youth, 

And still a sort of fisherman was he ; 

But other speculations were, in sooth, 

Added to his connection with the sea. Byron, 

Be still the unimaginable lodge 

For solitary thinkings ; such as dodge 

Conception to the very bourne of heaven, 

Then leave the naked brain. Keats, 

The world is full of orphans. Byron's MS. 

6e In six months we meet again ! " rang in my ear as the 
boat pulled down the pier, and beside the walls of the town 
to windward. I lost sight of the harbour ; and the voices 
of the men on board the schooner, cheering me as I passed, 
died away. I was compelled to arouse myself to steer the 
boat 3 which was indeed of the smallest description, a mere 
punt, of fifteen feet long, and five feet beam ; a man and 
a boy were my crew. During the night we made little 
way. There was a light but steady breeze blowing from 
the north-west directly in our teeth. We hugged the 
shore, pulling up to the southward, towards Cherbourg, 
making little way with our two oars. After seven hours' 
tugging against the breeze, we let go the grapnel, and the 
man and his boy went to sleep. I kept a look-out, and 
saw the fishing boats and a privateer lugger creeping out 
to sea, and crawling along the coast ; but they could not 
see an object so low in the water and insignificant as our 
boat. A thorough seaman never sleeps more than four 
hours at a spell ; at the expiration of that time it was 



510 ADVENTURES OP 

broad daylight, and the old seaman arose, pulling off a 
water-proof shaggy pea-green jacket, and shaking him- 
self like an old mastiff. The young sea-whelp, coiled up 
under the bow, in a space where a spaniel would have 
turned and twisted for a long time ere he could have 
stowed himself in comfort, endured many curses and some 
kicks before he turned out of his kennel. The seaman 
then, dipping a couple of his fingers in the water, rub- 
bed his eyes, which is called a privateer's wash ; and lift- 
ing a small ten-gallon keg, he placed it on his lap, and 
supported it like a baby. 

At this, the boy handed him a wooden scoop, used for 
baling the water out of the boat, when he drew the spigot 
till it was about a third part full of brandy, first asked me if I 
would take a sup of the doctor, then drank it off like new 
milk, handed the boy a drop, and replaced the keg. Thus 
refreshed, he fished out of his pocket a small telescope, took 
a survey all round the compass, declared the coast was 
clear, and ordered the boy to weigh the grapnel, whilst he 
shipped the boat's mast. Under a small sprit-sail and jib 
we made a stretch over. We did not lay our course, but 
the tide was running up channel, and carried us to wind- 
ward. 

Associated with men of many different nations, I had 
acquired a habit of studying their dissimilarities of 
character ; and the man in the boat being unlike any thing 
I had hitherto seen, I, by degrees, turned the tide of my 
thoughts from brooding on the past, to the fellow who was 
continually before my eyes. Like all old seamen, he was 
remarkably taciturn. Whether he was French or English 
it was impossible to tell either by looks or language ; for 
he used both languages indiscriminately, and pronounced 
both equally badly. His visage was hard and bluff as a 
rock, of which it seemed a fragment ; his hair, never 
sophisticated by a comb, and matted together with salt- 
water, resembled dark sea -weed, speckled with incrustations 
of salt ; his chin and throat were covered with a week's 
growth of gristled stubble ; his figure was short, particu- 
larly square, and, with his red cap, shaggy pea-green 
jacket down to his knees, and tarpaulin trowsers had he 



A YOUNGER SON. 511 

been seated on a rock in India, I think I should have had 
a shot at him, mistaking him for an ugly specimen of the 
walrus. By degrees, I gathered from him that he was a 
native of Guernsey, but had, for some reason or other, 
migrated to Jersey, where he had married the widow of a 
drowned smuggler. She inherited from her deceased 
husband a snug cabin, built in the bite of a sandy bay ; 
and he was prouder than a lord of the rights and privileges 
of this manor, although it consisted entirely of barren sand; 
for on that the sea, at every spring-tide, sported, and 
thence arose his wealth. On the overflowing of the sea 
depended his livelihood, like the Egyptians on the over- 
flowing of the Nile, and the people of India on that of the 
Ganges ; for the high tides in the channel are frequently 
preludes to gales, and gales are followed by wrecks, when, 
favoured by the tides, which swept directly into the said 
bite, formed into a narrow bay by reefs, casks and other 
buoyant articles were borne thither, of which his hawk- 
eyed wife, always on the watch, made lawful prize. A 
few days before, he had thus picked up two pipes of 
Lisbon wine, which he called a god-send, and promised me 
as many gallons as I chose, seeing I did not seem to like 
the other genuine stuff he drank. He said he sometimes, 
on shore, drank a tub or two of wine, if it was strong ; 
but it didn't do to take to sea, took up too much room, and 
didn't make a man's inside water-proof, which good Nantz 
would. Besides smuggling in a retail sort of way, he 
sometimes aided and abetted the wholesale smugglers, by 
acting as their pilot ; for he had been flve-and-twenty 
years constantly at sea in the channel, and knew every 
bay, creek, and land mark. Nor was he very particular in 
his services ; as he often piloted the ships of war of France 
as well as of England, being equally acquainted and 
friendly with both coasts. 

We turned to windward during the day, occasionally 
using the oars, for the wind was light, the hardy boatmen 
taking advantage of the tides and currents, without which 
we should have done nothing. Towards nightfall he said, 
" We must now make those rochers to windward, before 
the tide shall turn : — moor the boat under their lee till 



512 ADVENTURES OF 

three in the morning, demain matin, when it shall again 
turn in our favour. To-morrow, at night, you shall, sans 
etre appergu, run in my cove, and you stay there as long 
as — comme il vous plaira." 

Accordingly we struck the mast of the boat, and pulled 
her up to the rocks ; they were four or five, about as big, 
above water, as the mud barges used in the Thames. I 
climbed up the largest, while the old pilot said, " I gene- 
rally touches at these rochers, to pick up a few red coats 
(lobsters), " parceque ma chere femme has deucedly gout 
for him ; and there be plenty ici" 

He then began spinning me a long yarn about the habits 
of eels and lobsters, which abounded among the rocks, and 
that the eels went there purposely to eat lobsters. The 
way they got them was by blockading the holes wherein 
the lobsters took refuge, when casting off their old coats ; 
if they ventured forth ere the new shells were hardened, 
the eels attacked and devoured them. He then went to 
work with a sort of harpoon, and succeeded in striking and 
bringing up both eels and lobsters ; while the boy, with a 
knife, dislodged oysters, muscles, limpets and periwinkles. 
After a fishy supper, the pilot, having unlocked his jaw 
by repeated applications to the brandy keg, told me long 
and curious stories concerning his sea adventures with 
French and English, including the Flying Dutchman, 
which marvel he plentifully vouched with oaths, about as 
true as a common affidavit. At last, giving me the boat's 
sail for a bed, he stretched himself out on the jagged rocks, 
and slept soundly as the unsanctified in a comfortable pew 
of a church ; — I wish the benches were softer, and the 
cushions higher, as then more people might be tempted to 
take a nap ; it is my only reason for never going. 

It was not then the hardness of my couch, nor did it 
disturb me that I was placed, like a bird, on a solitary rock 
in the sea. It was a fit resting place for an outcast and 
isolated being like myself. Ere I entered on the new era 
of life before me, my thoughts naturally reverted to the 
past. I sat pondering on a destiny so strange as mine, 
wondering how it would end. 

There are more helpless beings in the world than 



A YOUNGER SON. 513 

orphans, whose young affections sleep like frozen water- 
falls^ till love, from some being, like the sun in spring, 
rises and awakens their peaceful slumbers ; or rather their 
affections are created in that moment, and the vacancy in 
their heart is filled up in the most harmonious manner. 
Far more cruel is the lot of those (and the world is full 
of them) who have hard-hearted and unfeeling parents ; 
or, still worse, those who are selfish and indifferent, ex- 
acting from their helpless and dependent offspring duty 
and obedience, without giving, in return, a single glance of 
kindness, chilling by frowns the spontaneous love which 
flows from children in torrents. I was of this forlorn 
tribe. My parents' hard usage and abandonment had long 
gnawed at my heart, till years of absence, in which both 
body and mind had expanded, taught me that it was the 
worst of slavery to submit the freedom of either to those 
whom we cannot esteem nor love. The pride of my 
nature impelled me to shake off the bondage. I did so. 
I could not endure the weight of slavery ; but I cheerfully 
put on the heaviest chains the foes of liberty have to im- 
pose, — and they are heavy. I walked with an elevated 
front. Alone I withstood a fate that would have over- 
powered thousands, often defeated, it is true, but ever in 
losing I have still won. In this hard struggle I had 
little refreshment but from the fountains of my own soul. 
Had I not clung to myself, the atrocity of others had 
made me a demon. In the very onset of my freedom, I 
gained, what neither wealth nor rank can purchase — the 
friendship of the really noble ; and the far dearer love of 
one, the gentlest child of nature, a being on whom I might 
securely repose. My spirit basked in the brightness of 
her presence. I could neither then, nor now, conceive our 
love to be a childish passion, nor that it would not cling 
to me throughout my life. For the union of two hearts, 
formed to meet, nature had strung our souls with the 
same chord ; and, whether together or apart, it vibrated 
the same sound, the same aspiration, a sympathy so per- 
fect that it was a balsam poured on our hearts, leaving 
nothing on earth or in heaven to desire. We had loved 
with an excess of affection, which can alone justify excess. 

L L 



514 ADVENTURES OF 

It happened to us as to a child, who, seizing upon a 
branch and bending the whole tree over him, becomes 
embowered amidst clusters of golden fruit. Alas ! I 
imagined not that her sepulchre was placed by destiny so 
near her cradle. The light which love lent me for a 
moment was extinguished, never more to be rekindled. 
Misfortune threw her huge shadow across my path, and I 
was doomed to walk benighted beneath the mid-day sun, 
never more to know peace nor rest till my dust is mingled 
with Zela's, atom to atom. What joy in this world for 
one who has drunk misanthropy out of the fulness of 
love ? My being was an aching void. My heart refused 
to give forth any fruit. The fulness of sorrow is great, 
but how much greater is its emptiness ? I thought, in the 
sea around me, I could behold the fragments of my ship- 
wrecked life floating. I stood up, and, speaking aloud, 
said, " When will the swell and storm die away, and the 
dead calm of this great ocean come ? When shall I be 
given up by its depths, and be borne unresistingly upon 
its bosom to the distant, still shores of eternity ? " 



CONCLUSION. 

So on our heels a fresh protection treads, 

A power more strong In beauty, born of us 

And fated to excel us, as we pass 

In glory that old darkness. Keats. 

I am continuing this history of my life. The sequel 
will prove that I have not been a passive instrument of 
arbitrary despotism, nor shall I be found consorting with 
worldly slaves who crouch round the wealthy and power- 
ful. On my return to Europe, I found that earth's 
despots had gathered together all their gladiators to 
restore the accursed dynasty of the Bourbons. The 
war-cry in Europe was the inviolability and omnipotency 
of legitimate tyrants ; while helots, bigots, and fools, were 



A YOUNGER SON. 515 

let loose to exterminate liberty. I found every where a 
price set upon the heads of patriots ; they were robbed, 
prosecuted, judicially murdered or scoffed at, and driven 
from the herd of society like the pariahs of India ; to 
associate with them was to lose caste. From my soul, I, 
who had suffered so much from tyranny, abhorred op- 
pression. I sided with the weak against the strong ; 
and swore to dedicate myself, hand and heart, to war, 
even to the knife, against the triple alliance of hoary- 
headed impostors, their ministers and priests. When 
tyranny had triumphed, I followed the fortunes of those 
invincible spirits who wandered, exiled outcasts, over the 
world, and lent my feeble aid to unveil the frauds con- 
tained in worn-out legends which have so long deluded 
mankind. 

Alas ! those noble beings are no more ! They have 
fallen martyrs to the noble cause they so ably advocated. 
But they have left enduring monuments, and their names 
will live for ever. Would they had lived to see the tree 
they had helped to plant put forth its blossoms ! Had 
they survived to the year 1830^ and its glorious suc- 
cessor 1831, how would they have rejoiced at beholding 
the leagued conspiracy of tyrants broken, their blood- 
hound priests muzzled, and the confederacy of nobles to 
domineer over the people paralysed by a blow, the pre- 
cursor of their overthrow ! The w r orld has a right to ex- 
pect that France, from her position and general inform- 
ation, will take the lead and keep it. Liberal and enlight- 
ened opinions have progressively manifested themselves in 
every part of Europe. " There is a reflux in the tide of 
human things which bears the shipwrecked hopes of men 
into a secure haven, after the storms are past/' 

" The very darkness shook, as with a blast 
Gf subterranean thunder at the cry ; 
The hollow shore its thousand echoes cast 
Into the night, as if the sea, the sky, 
The earth, rejoiced with new-born liberty ! " Shelley. 

Yes, the sun of freedom is dawning on the pallid 

slaves of Europe, awakening them from their long and 

deathlike torpor. The spirit of liberty, like an eagle, is 

hovering over the earth, and the minds of men are tinged 

l l 2 



516 



ADVENTURES OF A YOUNGER SON. 



with its golden hues. . Let France, like the eagle it once 
assumed in mockery for its emblem, now in reality 
teach her new-born offspring to soar aloft, undazzled 
by the bright luminary, when it shall have ascended 
to its meridian glory. Every eye and every hope of 
the good and wise are fixed on France; and with her 
every bosom containing a single generous impulse is vibrat- 
ing in sympathy. " Methinks those who now live have 
survived an age of despair : " 

" For freedom's battle once begun, 
Bequeathed from bleeding sire to son, 
Though baffled oft, is ever won." Byron. 



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